MAN NOT IMMORTAL: 



A REVIEW OF 



"REV." N. D. GEORGE ON 
ANNIHILATION. 



BY . 

4* ^ 

ED IT OK OF THE HEKALD OF LIFE. 



All the wicked will " God " destroy ^—Vs^. cxlv. 20. 

For they " shall be puBished with everlasting destructv'm^^^^ Thess. i. 9. 

"The wages of sin is death ; but the gift of God is eternal life^ thi'ongh Je- 
sus Christ our Lord." — Rom. vi. 23. 

"Christ . . . hath brought life and immortality to light through the gospel." 
^2 Tim. i. 10. 

" A.nd this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the 
Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life : and I will raise Idni up 
at the last John vi. 40. 

"Behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me/'— Rev. xxii. 12, 




NEW YORK: 

PUBLISHED AT THE OFFICE OF THE HERALD OP LIFE, 

131 Nassau St. 
1871. 



Sntered according to Act of Con^??, m the year 1871, !>y 
LEOXAED C. THOEXE, 
In tlie Office of the Librarian of Congresa, 
at Washington. 



The Library 
OF Congress 



WASHINGTON ^ 




PKEFACE 



Isaac Tatloe, a learned and justly eminent Chris- 
tian writer, lias said, with how much truth an already 
large and still increasing number of studious ones well 
know, that, When once this weighty question of tho 
after life has been opened, and when it shall have come 
into the hands of well-informed biblical interpreters, 
a controversy will ensue, in the progress of which it 
will be discovered that, with unobservant eyes, we and 
our predecessors have been so walking up and down, 
and running hither and thither, among dim notices 
and indications of the future destinies of the human 
family, as to have failed to gather up or regard much 
that has lain upon the pages of the Bible open and free 
to our use." The truth concerning man's nature and 
destiny is, we are compelled to believe, an essential 
part of the mugh that very many Christians ^^have 
failed to gather up," although it has lain upon the 
pages of the Bible open and free to their use. 



4 PEEFACE. 

Tj a consideration of the weighty question of the 
fAituYf) rlestinies of the race this work is devoted; 
and the importance of reaching just conclusions is aug- 
mentedj if possible, by the fact that they inyolye a de- 
termination of the great question of duration of evil. 
Experience has shown, it is believed, that there is no 
view concerning the doom of the impenitent which is 
so eminently calculated not only to impress the mind 
with the immeasurable advantages of conformity to 
divine requirements, but also to incite love to tlie 
Creator, as that of reduction of the persistently rebel- 
lious to non-existence, when it is seen that against 
that state is set an eternal life of blessedness, to be had 
lipon the simple condition of obedience. And yet not 
a few candid minds think they see in a contemplation 
of the final destruction of evil, the removal of a real and 
proper restraint. What is the truth of the matter? 
should first be settled, for surely the truth, whatever it 
is, and however antagonistic to our prejudices, is alto- 
gether beneficial, while error must of necessity be other- 
wise. 

The doctrine of eternal existence of sin exalts the 
sinner, while that of extinction of evil by the extinc- 
tion of evil doers, degrades him. It is unquestionably 
true that there is a certain dignity about an eternal per- 
sistence in sin ; and both sin and its punishment — if 
thepunishment be conscious suffering — cease, to a great 
extent, to be degrading when they become immortal. 



PKEFACEs 5 

A deep thinker has justly remarked : " The conceptiou 
of a wickedness thoroughly consistent, ever persistent, 
and eternally subsistent, is intrinsically admirable and 
sublime. Endless guilt implies the power to sin and 
rebel foreyer; and endless woe implies the capacity 
to suffer forever. It is a God-like faculty, if one can 
say to eyil, ' be thou my good,' with a purpose that 
cannot be broken through the lapse of eternal ages, 
... A mightier power may imprison and restrain 
him'' (the sinner) ; "but if an unconquerable will can 
still revolt, the power of eternal anguish sustains the 
dignity. The dignity is enhanced, if one may contend 
forever with justice, and tantalize retribution, by add- 
ing sin to sin, and still more, if one may ever grow 
in fiendish capacity and malignity. If there be such 
rebels, they may certainly glory in the prerogative of 
imposing burdens, il not cares, upon the divine admin- 
istration." 

In settling all questions respecting man^s destiny, 
the word of God is the only just and true standard of 
appeal. Overlooking this fact, in some important pai- 
.ticulars, Christians have fallen into grave and danger- 
ous errors. Therefore^ " to the law and to the testi* 
mony.'^ 



MAN NOT IMMOETAL. 

REVIEW OF "key/' D. GEORGE OIST AKI^TIHILATIOIir. 



OHAPTEE I. 

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. — THE PEISTALTY OE SIK. 

"What is man, and what is his relation to the Crea- 
tor ? Does some peculiar fact or quality of his nature 
entitle him to endless existence ? or does a provis- 
ion of divine law place an unending life within his 
reach ? In brief, is man immortal, or is he a candidate 
for immortality ? These are incomparably the most 
momentous questions that can engage human attention. 
In seeking right answers to them man is happily not left 
to speculation, the word of God affording the needed in- 
struction. "What the Scriptures teach on these points 
will, we trust, be clearly shown in the course of this in- 
vestigation. 

Although the author of the work under considera- 
tion has introduced no new argument against the unity 
of man's nature, his unconsciousness in death, and 
the literal destruction of the finally impenitent ; nor, 
consequently, adduced any thing in support of the 
theory of inherent or natural immortality which has not 
already been repeatedly presented and refuted, he has 
dashed into the subject at some points with a bold- 
ness not unfrequently bordering upon recklessness, 



8 



MAK ]SrOT IMMORTAL. 



often eyincingjSeemingly, a determination to sustain at 
all hazards certain notions, eyen where the current of 
Scripture testimony sets so strongly, nay overwhelm- 
ingly against them as to baffle and turn to utter 
nought the most skilled and learned efiorts to so much 
as create a ripple on the surface of its calm, majestic 
flow. "Whenever he has met with an opposing argu- 
ment that is susceptible of being by any adroit manoeuvre 
. turned from its proper and legitimate course, and car- 
ried to ludicrous conclusions, he has diligently sought 
to accomplish it. This style of warfare must, as alF 
know, to effect its purpose, be waged with both ability 
and dexterity ; but so far from this, his movements in 
that direction are, as must be apparent to any practiced 
eye, usually so clumsily effected and fall so far short of 
their aim, that they can be said to rise no higher than 
mere attempts, and must be seen by even casual observers 
to recoil upon the theory in the interests of which 
they are instituted. Some Scripture passages, that must 
ever be regarded by unbiased minds as arraying them 
selves in opposition to the popular theological views on 
the subject named,are confronted and treated in a man- 
ner clearly indicative of misapprehension, while others, 
mighty bulwarks of truth, are left untouched because, 
seemingly, to touch them would be to bring his theory 
and the truth into a strikingly unfavorable contrast. 

Before proceeding further let us consider certain of his 
plainly stated propositions. On page 184, he says : " We 
remark, too, that physical death is not the penalty 
of sin." Again, p. 191 : " And also that death, when 
threatened as a penalty, is not extinction, but conscious 
suffering.'' It is " spiritual death."— P. 189. 



REVIEW' OF ^' REV. D. GEORGE." 



9 



There is no better understood nor more rigidly 
observed rule in the creation of penal laws than is that 
of defining the penalty of violation by the use of terms 
the most unambiguous, comprehensible and unequivocal; 
nor is there a principle more strictly regarded in any 
department of human action than that which, in the 
establishment of the penal cocle^mdike^ the penalty pro- 
portionate to the offense. This principle was not always 
formerly recognized, the most extreme penalties being 
not ^infrequently imposed for the most trivial offences. 
When, however, under the increasing light of divine 
truth, the principles and requirements of justice became 
better understood, its administration was purged of many 
of the barbarous usages previously attending it. Since, 
then, in divine truth inheres the power to direct the hu- 
man mind to something like proper conceptions of justice 
in the enactment and execution of those laws which 
govern men as communities, we are certainly bound to 
believe that in the dealings of God, the Author of 
truth, with the race will appear the very perfection of 
justice in all its parts. Do the Creator^s dispensations 
to mankind, as recorded in sacred history, justify this 
faith ? None, we think, will deny it. But still more, 
do they not confirm it ? We affirm they do. Much 
might be adduced in proof of this, but one or two 
instances will fully suffice. 

When God, by Moses, gave the Decalogue to the 
children of Israel, He said : " Thou shalt not kill." 
That was a clearly stated law. He afterward defined 
the penalty of its violation in the following explicit 
terms : "He that smiteth a man, so that he die, shall be 
surely put to death." Again: "Thou shalt not steal." 



10 



MAK KOT IMMOKTAL. 



..." If a man shall steal an ox, or a sheep, ... he 
shall restore five oxen for an ox, and four sheep for a 
sheep/^ There is no ambiguity in any of this language ; 
and it was understood by the people. They did oiot un- 
derstand the death threatened them in the event of com- 
mission of murder to be any thing more or less than 
a literal depriyation of life. So T7ith all the laws, 
general and special, which God has given to men. 
Unless the Edenic circumstance be an exception, He has 
never expressed an extreme penalty by the nse of terms 
calculated to leave in the mind of the creature a doubt 
as to its nature. With this fact, then, in view, we are 
prepared to examine the Edenic law, and see whether 
the penalty of its violation was designated by the use of 
terms so equivocal and obscure as some assert. 

The clearly announced penalty of the simple law 
given to Adam was, " Thou slialt surely dieP l&o per- 
son would for a single moment entertain the thought 
that any thing was here meant to be understood other 
than just what this language implies, did not a theory 
of man's nature demand it. The meaning of death, 
here, is, says Mr. George, " spiritual death,'^ " con- 
scious suffering/' That he affirms to be the threatened 
penalty: and the "conscious suffering" he, of course, 
holds to be, in the case of the impenitent, eternal. 
There, dear reader, you have the theory of this pro- 
found thinker, with one of its beautiful features un- 
veiled. Just look at it ! God gave to Adam a law ex- 
pressed in plainest literal terms. He desired, of course 
— to suppose otherwise would be to charge Him with 
wilful deception — to state the penalty also, which was 
unending existence in suffering, in equally compre- 



KEVIEW OF "REV. IT. D. GEORGE." 11 

hensive, unmistakable language. That^ therefore, His 
creature Adam might not misapprehend it, but should 
know imperfectly to be eternal suffering, He said, " Thou 
shalt surely die." 

What mind of any thing like ordinary intelligence 
does not revolt at the simple thought ? Into just such 
surpassing folly does the theory of inherent immortality 
lead; just such untoward deception does it impute to 
an infinite, all-wise, loving Father ; and all because con- 
sidered indispensable to the preservation of a dogma. 
A doctrine which is so much a libel upon the char- 
acter of God, and the existence of which demands of 
its votaries such wallowing in the mire of such ex- 
treme absurdities may be thought a proper one to 
be cherished by all predetermined to its defence, but 
it will always immediately cease to be so estimated 
by as many as become more properly learned, as we be- 
lieve, in the school of Christ. The tendency of belief in 
natural immortality to so far blunt and divert men's 
moral and intellectual perceptions of divine govern- 
ment as to render the occupation and defence of such 
positions even possible, is of itself overwhelmingly con- 
demnatory of the theory. 

Profound John Foster, essayist, and clergyman in a 
Baptist church, asks the important question, May we 
not think that if so transcendently dreadful a doctrine 
had been meant to be taught, there would have been 
such forms of proposition, of circumlocution, if necessary, 
as would have rendered all doubt or question a mere 
palpable absurdity? " To this there can be but one re- 
ply. Every enlightened and honest heart must respond 
in unqualified affirmation. To do otherwise is to charge 



12 



MAK IsOT IMMORTAL. 



God with being less, far less than He so positively 
declares Himself to be. Dr. John Locke, the philoso- 
pher, wrote concerning the text under consideration : 
" It seems a strange way of understanding a law which 
requires the plainest and most direct words, that by 
deatJi should be meant eternal life in misery." Strange 
indeed is it beyond expression. The theory that re- 
quires an exposition so much at war with eyery principle 
of justice and sound sense, such wresting of the Scrip- 
tures to steady its tottering form is assuredly based upon 
a false foundation, and contains within itself the 
elements of its utter destruction. 

Upon the supposition that by " death," mentioned 
in connection with the Edenic law, was meant some- 
thing totally unlike that which the simple term imports, 
the question arises, would Adam, without being fully 
informed concerning that unnatural and peculiar mean- 
ing, understand it in any other than its literal sense ? 
There cannot be two opinions: all will agree that he 
would not. Well, does it appear that any such informa- 
tion Avas giyen him? It does not, and to maintain 
that he was so informed is to assert what not only can- 
not be proved, but also what must be esteemed an un- 
warranted assumption, since the record is silent on the 
point. That both our first parents understood the 
penalty to be literal death, deprivation of life, the 
circumstances attending the act of disobedience abun- 
dantly show. Mr. G. will find few indeed, even among 
advocates of inherent immortality, to agree with him 
that spiritual death, a condition of "conscious suffer- 
ing," of "wretchedness and sin," was the penalty 
threatened. 



REVIEW OF ^^REY. D. GEORGE." 



13 



Dr. Lange, writing upon the words of the serpent 
^^For God doth know that in the day/^ etc.;, says: 
" The imitation of the divine language contains a 
species of mockery. Your eyes, says the voice of the 
tempter, instead of closing in deatli, will be, for the first 
time, truly opened.'^ What a resemblance is there be- 
tween the serpent's language as paraphrased by the Dr., 
and the sentiment pronounced from many pulpits in 
the present time ! Dr. Adam Clarke says of the w^ords : 
"Ye shall not surely die:'^ "The tempter insinuates the 
impossibility of her dying, as if he had said, ' God has 
created thee immortal; thy death, therefore, is impos- 
sible; and God knows this.'" The undying soul is the 
real man, says popular theology, and as that is immor- 
tal its "death is impossible." How like what Dr. 
Clarke imputes to the serpent ! 

The author of the work under notice chafes under the 
pressure of the stubborn fact that his j)osition respect- 
ing the nature of man, and that literal death was not 
the penalty of sin, so exactly corresponds with the words 
of the serpent, and he finally endeavors to show there is 
some agreement between our position and the serpent's 
lie. This, however, as few of his readers will fail to see^ 
is a sort of forlorn hope, a desperate attempt to turn at- 
tention in another direction. Eye, until her unfortunate 
intercourse with the tempter, believed that eating of the 
forbidden fruit would result in her death, literal death, 
of course.- She informed the wily tempter that God had 
said so. This was met by the assertion, " ye shall not 
surely die; " and it was added, " God doth knov/ that in 
the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened." 
The first assertion is in perfect harmony with the theory 



14 



MA^T ?sOT i:ki:,IOETAL. 



we combat. It says, our first parents did ' not surely 
die.'^^ The condition into which it is claimed the guilty 
pair were by transgression plunged, is by no means al- 
together unlike that which the serpent declared they 
should experience. 

Nothing can well be more clear than that the death 
threatened as a penalty of yiolation of the Edenic law 
was a literal one, deprivation of life, extinction of the 
conscious being which God had so recently given them 
This is incontestably shown by the sentence pronounced 
upon Adam: "In the sweat of thy face slialt thou eat 
bread, tilH/^(9?^ return unto the ground: for out of it 
wast tliou taken: for dust tliou art, and unto dust shall; 
^7io?^ return." On page 63, Mr. George says : " Who be- 
lieves that corpses are men ? They are only the re- 
mains of men." The man, then, the person does not 
die at all. If this were true, how wrong was God, how 
right the serpent ! Christ and others, too, must have done 
the serpent great injustice in saying he lied, since Mr. 
G. has shown so conclusively that ha told the truth. 
But then they of course erred ignorantly, for the wise 
men of modern times were not there to instruct them. 
According to Mr. George, God committed a great 
blunder in saying, " dust tliou art, and unto dust shalt 
tliou return, for the man, the tliou was not dust, did not 
die, Avas not taken from the ground, neither returned 
unto it. But more upon this point hereafter. All the 
circumstances connected with the giving of the Edenic 
law, and the announcement of the sentence combine to 
prove that the penalty was literal death. 

The system of offerings and sacrifices under the Mosaic 
dispensation ^oresents an unanswerable argument against 



EEVIEW OF ^'EEY. ]Sr. D. GEOEGE.'^ 15 

the theory that spmtiial death, conscious suffering, is 
the penalty of cin. Paul says, And almost all things 
are by the law " (Mosaic law) purged with blood ; and 
without shedding of blood is no remission/' — Heb ix. 
22. The life is declared to be in the blood, and when 
that is shed death results. " But flesh with the life 
thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall ye not eaf — 
Gen. ix. 4. It was the death of the sacrifice that satisfied, 
for the time being, and procured remission. Death, then, 
deprivation of life, was Avhat violated law required : it 
was the wages of sin. In harmony with this Paul de- 
clared : "The wages of sin is death." — Eom. vi. 23. The 
question as to the nature of this death, this penalty of 
sin, is further settled by the character of the sin-offerings 
which effected the " remission " under the law. 

With Israel the " tenth day of the "seventh month " 
was set apart as the day of yearly sacrifice of atone- 
ment. "For on that day shall th^ priest make an 
atonement for you, to cleanse you, that you may be 
clean from all your sins before the Lord.'' — Lev. xvi. 30. 
Again : " This shall be an everlasting statute unto you, 
to make an atonement for the children of Israel for 
all their sins once a year." — ver. 34. What was it the 
blood, or life of which was accepted in the place of that 
of the sinner ? " And Aaron shall bring the bullock of 
the sin-offering, which is for himself, and shall make 
an atonement for himself, and for his house, and shall 
hill the bullock of the sin-offering." ..." Then shall he 
hill the goat of the sin-offering, that is for the people." — 
Lev. xvi. 11 and 15. All this means deatli, and there is 
no conscious suffering anywhere hinted at. Such an idea 
is nowhere recognized, because it forms no part of God's 



16 



MA^^ NOT i:\i:^IORTAL. 



plan, it having sprung up by human invention, many 
centuries after the giving of the law. Suffering exists, 
of course, in consequence of sin and in connection 
with the infliction of the penalty, but it is incidental 
merely, and forms no part of the penalty proper. 

For the life of the flesh is in the blood ; and I have 
given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement 
for your souls; for it is the blood that maketh an 
atonement for the soul." — Lev. xvii. 11. Here we have 
it again distinctly stated that the "life is in the 
blood and also that it was given to make an. atone- 
ment.'^ But this text, says one, teaches that men have 
souls. Yes, in much the same manner that all other 
texts so confidently relied on teach it. He must be dull 
indeed who cannot see at a glance that souls in the text 
are the children of Israel themselves. If any do not 
see it upon reading the yerse, they cannot fail to do so 
upon reading the following one. "Therefore I said 
unto the children of Israel, No soul of yoit shall eat blood, 
neither shall any stranger that sojourneth among you eat 
blood,'' Theological souls are not supposed to be so fond 
of eating as to require the restraint of a divine prohibi- 
tion. 

Some objector will say, " It is true the blood is the 
life of the lower animals, but the soul is the life of 
man, and when that departs death ensues.'' But hear 
the word of God ! He commanded the children of Is- 
rael not to eat the blood, for "it is the life of all flesh.'^ 

In all the threatenings of evil which God de- 
nounced against ancient Israel in case of disobedience, 
there was nothing worse than calamities of va- ious 
character, including death. Upon the supposition cLat 



KEYIEW OF '-PtEY. IST. D. GEORGE.'^ 17 

God intended to inflict upon them, in case of con- 
tinued disobedience, untold sufferings during all the 
endlessness of eternity, how can we account for the 
fact that He gave them no intimation whatever of it? 
If, as Mr. George contends, the doctrine of eternal suffer- 
ing is so salutary in its effects upon hardened sinners 
and upon society in general that it not only exerts 
an incomparably great restraining influence upon the 
ungodly, but induces faithfulness also, why did not 
God proclaim it to the people ? To put these ques- 
tions is to answer them. Assuming the doctrine to be 
true, was God ignorant of the wonderful results that 
mere knowledge of it would effect in turning sin- 
ners from their evil ways? How much wiser than 
God are some latter-day theologians ! The absence in all 
God^s threatenings toward His people of old, and in His 
denunciations against them, of any reference to a con- 
dition of suffering after death is more than suggestive, 
it may almost be considered as proof that the doctrine 
has no foundation in truth, but is a mere human in- 
vention. This we affirm it to be, and no amount of 
reasoning, true or false, can ever prove it otherwise, for it 
has no place in the word of God. 

But let us return and pursue still further our ex- 
aminations concerning the nature of the death an- 
nounced as the penalty of sin. The sacrifices under 
the law were a shadow of that which was to come. 
The offering of them secured to participants a passing 
over or transmission of their sins from year to year 
until God should offer a perfect sacrifice, a lamb with- 
out blemish for sins for all tim.e ; as it is written of Christy 
"after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat 



18 



MA2>r KOT im:moetal. 



down on the right hand of GodJ' Thus Christ was 
the perfect sacrifice ; and in order to make a complete 
and lasting atonement he certainly suffered the penalty, 
whatever it is. Peter declares, " Christ also suffered for 
us/^ What did Christ suffer ? "Was it spiritual death ? 
Mr. G. must contend that .Christ did die a spiritual 
death, since he maintains that it is the penalty of the 
law, the penalty "Adam suffered immediately in the 
day he sinned.^^ — p. 30. 

What is this spiritual death ? Mr. G. defines it thus : 
" It is a condition of sin and wa^etchedness : it is to 
" lose the life of God.''— p. 189. Christ, then, accord- 
ing to this author's theory, lost " the life of God/^ fal- 
ling into " a condition of sin and wretchedness ; " he 
became "alienated from the hfe of God^' (the italics 
are his). Mr. George doubtless holds in common with 
the generality of, so-called, orthodoxists that Christ is 
God, that he is a part of the Deity. Did one part of 
God lose the life of the other part ? Or did God lose 
his own life ? Is God Himself divisible ? Then the 
theological soul is greater than God, for that is held to bo 
indivisible. Is the Creator of heaven and earth capable 
of being plunged into " a condition of sin and wretch- 
edness ?" ■ Mr. George quotes very approvingly from 
Mr. Landis' work, entitled The Im:\ioktality of the 
Soul, axd Fiintal Co]srDiTio:N" of the Wicked. We 
will also quote from that work, and Mr. G. will, if 
consistent, recognize his own position in that of Mr. 
Landis though, perhaps, stated more clearly than may 
be thought altogether desirable. On page 259, he says : 

In the sense of the penalty of the Divine law, death 
is the displeasure of God, and the soul that suffers that 



EEYIEW OF "EEY. 1^". D. GEORGE." 



19 



penalty is cut off from the source of spiritual life and 
happiness^ a breaking up of all harmony betTveen God 
and the creature/^ 

The reader will notice a striking similarity between 
the yiews of Messrs. Landis ^nd George^ respecting 
the penalty of sin. They substantially agree. On p. 
262, of Mr. Landis' work, it is written, "our blessed 
Eedeemer suffered the penalty of the law for his people.-'^ 
There, reader, you haye it in all the strength and con- 
sistency and beauty it can command. How do you 
like the looks of it? Christ spiritually dead! Our 
Eedeemer in "a condition of sin and wretchedness!'^ 
Christ '* cut off from the source of spiritual life and 
happiness!" Unto such blasphemy does the doctrine 
which makes spiritual death the penalty of sin in- 
evitably lead. In the "gross darkness" of such worse 
than absurdities will men grope in order to save a theory. 
These blasphemies are legitimate conclusions of the 
immortal soul theory. And this doctrine that, in this 
age of freedom of thought and action is deluging 
Christendom with infidelity, the world is asked to be- 
lieve. They who can so far cast off the shackles of pre- 
judice as to search for themselves the word of God, will 
reject it as mischievous beyond measure, v/hile very 
many, many will continue to think the Bible teaches it in 
its various parts, and so vdll reject both it and the Bible 
as equally unworthy of confidence, and will reject 
Christ as welL Look carefully over the history of the 
doctrine since the third and fourth centuries of the 
Christian era, when it began to gain much strength in 
the church, and note how very few are the evils 
and monstrous abominations of which it has not been 



20 



MAN" KOT IMMOETAL. 



^ ell, then, since Christ did not die a " spiritual 
death/^ did he suffer eternal torment? No one will 
be so mad as to claim that he did ; and yet they should 
claim it, if that is the penalty, or else admit that there 
has been no atonement made. Christ did suffer death, 
literal death. His sacrifice was in harmony with its 
types, the sacrifices under the law. It was the shed- 
ding of blood, which is the life. He said, " This is my 
Hood of the New Testament, which is slied for many.^^ — 
Mark xiv. 24. But God commendeth his love toward us, 
in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. 
Much more, then, being now justified by his lloodP — 
• Rom. Y. 8, 9. Forasmuch as ye know that ye were not 
redeemed with corruptible things. . . . But with the 
precious Hood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish 
and without spot."— 1 Pet. i. 18, 19. 

Says Paul, " The wages of sin is death.'^ — Eom. yi. 
23. The Greek term for death, in this passage, is the 
same as in the following: ^*'But we see Jesus, who 
w^as m^ade a little lower than the angels, for the suf- 
- fering of death, crowned with glory and honor; that 
he, by the grace of God should taste death for eyery 
;i^an.'^ — Heb. ii. 9. Are we to belieye that ^'by the 
grace of God Christ " lost the life of God,'' suffered 
" sin and luretchedness for eyery man ? " For as often 
as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do show 
the Lord's death till he come.'' — 1 Cor. xi. 26. Here, 
too, we haye the same Greek term. Did the Corinthian 
brethren, wheneyer they ate of the bread and drank of the 
cup show forth the Lord's " sin and wretchedness," his 
" alienation from the life of God " till he come ? Of 
Simeon it is said, and it was reyealed unto him by the 



REYIEW OF ^'EEY. is". D. GEOKGE/' 



21 



Holy Ghost, that he should not see death before he 
had seen the Lord's Christ." — Lnke ii. 26. We have 
here, again, the same y/ord. Good old Simeon would 
hardly have been pleased with the assurance from the 
Holv Ghost that he should not have sin and wretched- 
ness," be alienated /ro;?^ the life of God^' till he had 
seen Christ. He could not reasonably haye been ex- 
pected to be anxious to behold the Prince of Peace. 
Had he, haying seen the Saviour, contemplated such 
a sad experience we would never haye heard of his 
exclaiming, " Lord, now lettest thou thy seryant depart 
in peace, according to thy word.^^ 

Paul declared : Christ died for our sins according 
to the Scriptures ; and that he was buried.'^ Will Mr. 
George; y/ill Mr. Landis; will any of the, so-called, 
orthodox theologists dare openly say he did not ? And 
yet they practically deny it. Dead persons are not 
meyij says Mr. G., they are only the remains of men.'^ 
Then it was no part of Christ that died ; what went 
into the graye was only the remains of Christ. If this 
be true then we are all in our sins^ and the sufferings 
of Christ were yain. 0 what lamentable folly ! " I am 
he,'^ said the glorified Redeemer, " that liyeth, and was 
deadP 

We haye shov/n that the penalty named in the 
^Idenic law was not understood, and could not, under 
l:he circumstances, have been understood in any other 
than its literal sense. We haye shown, too, that the 
penalty mentioned in connection with the Sinai tic law 
was literal death, and that it was so understood. We 
haye further shown that the system of offerings and 
sacrifices under the Mosaic econoni}^, requiring, as it 



22 



MA^T ^^OT IM3I0RTAL, 



did, the shedding of the blood of the yictim, its de-* 
priyation of life, was an unquestionable recognition 
of what we maintain is the fact, that literal death is the 
penalty of sin. And lastly, we have shown also that 
Christ, in the yielding up of his life, in the shedding of 
his blood unto death as an atonement,^^ as an oflfering 
of one sacrifice for sins forever," suffered that penalty 
and that only. We are, therefore, absolutely shut up to 
the conclusion that literal death is the penalty of sin. 
Other evils are, of course, sometimes suffered but they 
are, as we have remarked, merely incidental, or, as has 
sometimes been the case, denounced as special judgments 
upon nations, communities, or individuals. 

Death was so explicitly stated in the beginning to 
be the penalty of sin, and has been so positively 
reiterated at various times by inspiration, nothing less 
than the most cogent, resistless reasons for attaching to 
the term an unnatural meaning can be reasonably held 
to justify its being ^done. Are there such considerations 
urged ? There is not so much as one not either based 
upon or suggested by the assumption of natural or in- 
herent immortality. That which is, perhaps, the least 
so, and is largely dwelt upon by Mr. George, is the fact 
that our first parents did not die a physical death the 
day they sinned. 

This objection must, in view both of the circum- 
stances and the record, be esteemed pitifully incom- 
petent. Those theologists who so strenuously urge it 
can scarcely be unav/are that the marginal reading con- 
tains the true rendering of the words which express 
the penalty. That rendering is, ^- dying thou shalt die.^' 
We are, as suggested, quite willing to allow that Dr. 



REVIEW OE ^^EEY. K. D. GEORGE.'^ 23 

Adam Clarke knew something of both Hebrew and 
Greek, and we doubt not our " Eev/^ brother will regard 
him as pretty reliable authority on this text. Of the 
words dying thou shalt die/' he says — " viutli tamutli, 
literally . . . dying tlioit slialt die. From that moment 
thou shalt become mortal, and shalt continue in a 
dying state till thou die. This we find literally accom- 
plished: eyery moment of his life, man may be con- 
sidered as dying . . . Other meanings haye been giyen 
to this passage, but they are in general either fanciful 
or incorrect." Of the expression, "dust thou art, and 
unto dust shalt thou return," the same commentator 
says: 

" God had said that in the day they ate of the for- 
bidden fruit, dying tliey sliould die : they should then 
become mortal. . . . The tree of life, as we have already 
seen, was intended to be the means of continual preser- 
yation. For as no being but God cau exist indepen- 
dently of any supporting agency, so man could not 
haye continued to live without a particular si^pporting 
agent ; and this supporting agent, under God, appears 
to haye been the tree of life." 

On page 27, Mr. George says Those who are but 
slightly acquainted with the Hebrew idiom yery well 
know that our yersion" (shalt surely die) '^conyeys 
precisely the meaning of the original." We certainly 
haye no objection whatever to the reading of the text : 
it is quite satisfactory to us. But when it is urged that 
the language means something entirely different from 
what God manifestly designed in the use of it, we 
show that what not only competent authorities affirm, 
but also what the Bible itself marginally indicates to be 



34 



MA^r JsOT IMMORTAL. 



a more perfect renderings positively forbids tlie interpre- 
tation insisted upon. He will not deny Dr. Clarke 
some slight acqnaintance " with the Hebrew idiom/^ 
hence we, for the present, at least, leave him to settle 
matters with the Dr.; and as they are of the same 
school, an amicable adjustment, in which due reverence 
to acknowledged learning and ability will be shown, 
should not be thought impossible. The Dr., like many 
others, greatly erred in supposing that Adam was cre- 
ated immortal, but became mortal by transgression. 
Had man been created immortal the possibility of death 
would have been precluded. Holding the immortal soul 
theory, and yet admitting that the penalty was literal 
death, the Dr. overlooked the fact that as the penalty 
was executed upon the body, the fancied soul, the 
really guilty party went free. 

Bishop Law, speaking on Heb. ii. 14, 15, says : 

" It will be necessary to attend to the true meaning 
of the word Deaths as it is strictly and properly ap- 
plied in Scripture ; and this may be best seen by looking 
back to the remarkable passage where it is first used, 
in that denunciation which brought Adam and his pos- 
terity under it ; and where we must suppose it used in 
all the plainness and propriety of speech imaginable. 
And, accordingly, we find the original here, as full and 
emphatical as words can make it. They are translated — 
Thou shalt surely — but might with more strictness 
have been rendered — Thou shalt utterly die; which 
one would think sufficiently explained in the sentence 
passed on our first parents, where they are reminded of 
their original, and of that state to which this change 
should reduce them. ^In the sweat of thy face shalt 
thou eat bread, till thou return unto the ground, for out 
of it wast thou taken; dust thou art, and unto dust 



REVIEW OE "EEY. D. GEOP.GE" 



25 



slialt thou return/ Nov/ what do we imagine they could 
possibly understand by this denunciation but a resump- 
tion of that natural life or conscious being, which their 
Creator had been lately pleased to bestow upon them ? 
the forfeiting vdiich must include a total loss of all those 
benefits that tlien did, or ever could proceed from him ? 
This surely, and nothing less, must be implied in that 
most solemn sentence; nor can we well conceive the 
unhappy subjects of it to have been at that time so very 
ingenious as to explain it away by distinguishing upon 
the several component parts of their constitution, and 
concluding, that by death no more v\^as intended than only 
a separation of these parts, while the principle of them 
was still living in some different manner, or that it 
was a continuation of their consciousness and real exis- 
tence, though in some other place. 'No, this luas the 
philosophy of after ages; concerning which, all I shall 
say at present is, that some of its most eminent 
patrons cannot help observing, that they ^do not find 
it in the Scriptures/ [Tillotson, vol. ii. Ser. 100.] 
These, in their obvious meaning, represent the vohole 
man, individual, person, or being, as included in the 
sentence addressed to him; nor do they seem to take 
notice of any other circumstance in the case, beside that, 
so often mentioned, of his returning to the ^ dust or 
ground from whence he was taken ;' and might not 
the first pair as well expect, that the same ' breath of life, 
w^hich the Lord God had breathed into his nostrils, 
w^hereby man became a living souV should still sur- 
vive the execution of that sentence, or that the dust 
itself should praise God; as that any kind of know- 
ledge of, or communication with him, should continue 
in that state of darkness and destruction to which they 
were then doomed 

Dr. Lange says concerning the penalty Dying, 
death, the sense of these words he can only anticipate, 



26 



MAl^ KOT IM:M0ETAL. 



according as their contrast with the sense of the tree 
of life grows more clear. At the moment of the fall 
began the death of man. Death waxes stronger with us 
until it outgrows life, and conquers it.^^ Thus we see 
they who hold to the unity of man's nature, are not the 
only ones who demand a literal interpretation of the 
term which expresses the "penalty of sin." 

Few of the more thoughtful theologistic members 
of the, so-called, orthodox school haye been so unwary 
as to fall squarely into the peculiarly illogical and un- 
scriptural position boldly assumed by Mr. George. We 
haye already stated, as will be remembered, that on 
page 63 he says : "Who belieyes that corpses are men ? 
They are only the remains of men." This is certainly 
wandering just as far from the truth in this matter as 
he could possibly get. The Bible position is that the 
man is a soul; while Mr. G-. holds that the soul is a 
man. These positions would not of necessity differ 
widely were there held by him to be only 07ie entity re- 
presented in the living being called man: but as he 
contends there are ttoo, the positions are antipodal. 
The soul, says he, is the ma?i ; the organization which 
we see is, when the soul leayes it, only the remains of a 
man. This statement possesses the merit of tangible- 
ness and simplicity. When, then, it is said, "The 
Lord Grod formed man of the dust of the ground," it is 
meant that He formed out of the dust an "im- 
material," " uncompounded," "indiyisible" something 
— though how it could thus be something is an un- 
solyable mystery — called an immortal sotd, breathed 
into the nostrils of this immortal soul the breath of 
life ; and the immortal soul became allying soul. If any 



KEVIEW OF "KEY. I^. D. GEORGE." 27 

thing about this is seen to be most grotesquely absurd, 
the responsibility will^ of course, be placed where it 
belongs, upon the theory. Frivolous and meaningless as 
these conclusions are, they are neyertheless not only 
legitimate but unayoidable. 

Then, again, the language, dust thou art, and unto 
dust shalt thou return," must have been addressed to the 
immortal soul, that being the man. What, then, upon 
this writer's theory, becomes of the undying soul? 
Affirming it to be the ma7i, and not denying that the 
77ia7i was formed of the dust of the ground," Mr. George 
is the very last one in all the world to make use of the 
term ^^materialist," with reference to others, since his 
position involves him inextricably in an extremely in- 
consistent, unreasonable, and unscriptural form of ma- 
terialism. What could be more illogical and unscrip- 
tural, for instance, than to make, as his position compels 
him to do, the sentence of dissolution, extinction of 
conscious being to apply to the very object which he 
contends is absolutely incapable of dissolution ? 

Charity requires of us the assumption that the as- 
sertor of this fallacious proposition failed to fairly weigh 
it. Did not charity thus require, we would, in conse- 
quence of some strong indications in that direction, be 
under the necessity of concluding that he regarded it 
the very best Avay of escape from a certain difficulty, 
and staked the chances of success upon a possibility 
that it would escape critical notice. But this thought, 
as we have intimated, we cannot entertain. He will not 
forget it was the mem that was condemned to return 
unto the ground, from whence he was taken. 

And then, too, he will be under the necessity of 



28 



MAIT KOT I2»niOrwTAL. 



harmonizing his singular position vath the fact that 
what he is pleased to denominate the remains of a man 
was, in the case of Adam, called man defore that by 
which he became a living, conscious being was ad- 
ded. These are strange difficulties for a thinking man 
to fall into, but we know of only one way of escape, 
and that is to back squarely and gracefully out, and 
forsake the delusive theory that leads to them. Should 
he think to get out of the difficulties by concluding it 
was what would finally be the remains of a man, or the 
tenement which the man inhabited, that was " formed 
of the dust of the ground,'^ while the man, being a liv- 
ing soul, came from God, he will have a matter to ad- 
just with Paul, who says of this same 7nan, Adam, who 
lecame a living sonl, that he was " of the earth, earthy.'' 
He will thus conflict, too, with God's account of the 
creation, lor that expressly affirms man was made of 
the dust; and it also says of the lower animals that 
they are living souls. 

A doctrine that requires of its patrons such ludicrous 
exhibitions of inconsistency can lay no just or reasonable 
claim to divine origin. It is a human invention, and 
human wisdom is wholly unable to clothe it in garments 
that will prevent the piercing light of truth from enter- 
ing and revealing its repulsive form. 

"When Adam had sinned, God placed a "flaming 
sword" to keep the way of ''the tree of life," lest Ad- 
am should " put forth his hand, and take also of the 
tree of life, and eat, and live forever." As the man pro- 
per is held to have been immortal and, therefore, could 
not die, the expression live forever could not have 
had reference to a continuance of living existence, for 



EEYIEW OE "BEV. l!^-. D. GEOEGE." 29 

that lie would have y/hether he ate of the fruit of the 
tree of life or not; but it must^ according to the theory 
we are considering, have had reference to the opposite of 
the death Adam died, which is held to haye been a 
spiritual one. But is there a man to be found who 
■would be willing to aiErm, or even seriously assume that 
the Edenic tree of life possessed the quality of im- 
parting spiritual life ? We think not. No thought- 
ful person can fail to see the utter absurdity of the 
theory that the threatened penalty was spiritual death. 
At every turn it does gross violence to the most palpable 
principles of exegesis, of reason and sound sense. 

The simple truth is, Adam was created, placed in 
the garden, and surrounded with everything calculated 
to promote his happiness. A law was given him con- 
sisting of this simple commandment : " Of every tree of 
the garden thou mayest freely eat : but of the tree of the 
knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it : for 
in the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die," 
or dying thou shalt die." Man, in common Vvitli 
all the creatures that were made, was created an animal 
or mortal being, but a candidate for immortality, and 
was granted access to the tree of life, by eating of the 
fruit of which, his life would be preserved until such 
time as God — provided Adam kept the law, should 
choose to confer upon him an immortal or spiritual ex- 
istence. But obeying the lusts of the carnal or fleshly 
mind, which ^^is not subject to the law of God," he trans- 
gressed the law, and the penalty, dying thou shalt die," 
was inflicted by depriving him of the right to partake of 
the tree of life. Thus left to himself, nature, as Drs. 
Clarke and Lange rightly claim, weakened and faded 



so 



MA^T NOT IMMOKTx\.L. 



until, at last, lie died; and then transpired the last 
threatened consequence of his transgression, dust thou 
art, and unto dust shalt thou return/^ 

Adam's condition after being driven from the garden, 
is the condition of all his posterity, except the Second 
Adam, Jesus Christ. They come into the world pos- 
sessing no nature or principle of life other than that 
of animal; and if, by refusing the offers of mercy, 
and doing despite to the spirit of grace, which God 
gives to abide in them, and which will, if obedience is 
yielded to it, enable them to develop a character in har- 
mony with Him, they fail to become possessed of any 
higher life principle, they pass through life into death; 
a death so irrevocable that if the redemption scheme had 
been rendered incomplete by the non-resurrection of 
Jesus, even them, as Paul emphatically declared, who 
have fallen asleep in Christ'^ would have pevislied. 
How very simple and reasonable is this. The truth 
is quite apt to be plain and simple, but error is always 
found to be unwieldly and hard to manage. 

Ye shall not surely die,'' said the serpent, to Eve. 
"Ye shall not surely die," say our author and other 
immortal-soulists. "Thou slialt surely die," said the 
Lord our God, and we are firm in the faith that it is 
altogether safe and wise and right to believe Him. TVe 
hold that few facts are more evident than that deatli^ ex- 
tinction of conscious being, as the penalty of sin, is 
the uniform testimony of inspiration throughout the 
Bible. The men who preach otherw^ise, who teach 
that the man cannot thus die, do, ignorantly and un- 
meaningly, no doubt, resist the truth, give currency 
to the serpent's falsehood, overturn the very foundations 



REVIEW OF "REV. D. GEORGE." 31 

of Christianity, and perform a mighty work in re- 
cruiting the ranks of infidelity. To sucli we humbly 
say, seek, by earnest studiousness and prayer, to over- 
come prejudice, to Icnovj the reasonable truths which 
God asks His reasonable creatures to accept, and so no 
longer charge Him with demanding an acceptance of 
what is itself wholly unreasonable, and expressed, were it 
true, in altogether unreasonable terms* 



CHAPTER II. 

"CAisJI^s^OT KILL THE SOUL.^ 

We now proceed to examine tne one passage ^hich 
the author of the v\^ork under notice relies on to prove 
the doctrine of inherent immortality, and also the very 
few prominent passages wh-ich he believes support his 
exposition of the one. That we may not be misappre- 
hended in any of our observations, we remark, in the 
language of Mr. Read, Bible vs. TRADixiOiq-, that the 
Bible meaning of soul is, a creature that lives by 
breathing; and as the essential endowment of such a 
creature is life, so life will stand often as a correct mean- 
ing of soul. When soul is applied to man, it may be trans- 
lated life^ SOUL, man, you, yourself, person, myself thy- 
self, etc., according to the text.^^ 

Nephesh is the Hebrew term generally translated 
soul. It occurs about seven hundred times, and is ren- 
dered soul four hundred and seventy-one times; life and 
living, about one hundred and fifty ; and is also rendered 
a man, a person, self, they, me. Mm, any one, Ireatli, 
heart, mind, ap)petite, the dody (dead, as well as alive,) 



32 



MAiT IsOT IMMOETAL. 



efcc. It is also twenty-eight times applied to beasts, SLud 
to every creejmig thing. The Greek term corresponding 
to the Hebrew nejoliesli, is pmclie. It occurs one hun- 
dred and five times, and is translated soul fiffcy^nine 
timeS;, and life forty times. It is also, like nepliesli^ other- 
wise variously translated, twice being applied to beasts. 
The foregoing renderings of the Hebrew and Greek 
terms mentioned, are given on the authority of Bible 
V8, Teadition, an excellent work. 

Dr. Parkhurst says Nepliesli, as a noun, hath been 
supposed to signify the spiritual part of man, or what we 
commonly call the soul. I must confess I can find no 
passage where it hath undoubtedly this meaning.^' What 
do our present-day theologaes K:;ay to that ? The term 
which is four hundred and seventy-one times, in our 
English version, represented by a word, the very use of 
which is believed to confirm the view that man is pos- 
sessed of a spiritual entity capable of separate conscious 
existence, cannot be found by a learned writer to have 
that meaning in any instance. 

The one passage, upon his explication of which Mr. 
George stations himself, and strives to make everything 
bend to it, is Matt. x. 28 : 

"And fear not them which "kill the body, but are 
not able to kill the soul : but rather fear him which is 
able to destroy both soul and body in hell.^^ 

The corresponding passage in Luke reads: 

"And I say unto you my friends, Be not afraid of 
them that kill the body, and after that have no more 
that they can do. Bat I will forewarn you whom ye 
fehallfear: Fear him, which after he hath killed hath 



EEYIEW OE "KEY. D. GEORGE/^ 33 

power to cast into hell; yea^ I say unto yon, Fearhim/^ 
— Luke xii. 4, 5. 

We are quite willing to admit that there is no passage 
in the Bible more difficult to explain to the satisfac- 
tion of believers in the doctrine of the immortality of 
the soul, than the one first quoted aboye. But let it 
be borne in mind, that the seeming sentiment of no one, 
two or three passages of Scripture may safely or wisely 
be held to teach what the yery many others manifestly, 
nay, undeniably discountenance and oppose, and espe- 
cially when the few are susceptible of a reasonable ex* 
position in harmony with the manifest sentiment of the 
many. The ignoring of this just principle has pro- 
duced lamentable results : its fruits are eyil, and only 
eyil. That this passage is susceptible not only of an 
explication in entire harmony with the multitude that 
oppose what it is by many supposed to teach, but one 
which is more reasonable also than that giyen it by 
theologists generally, we design to sufficiently show. 

Whatever teaching may be credited to the passage, 
it cannot consistently be held to teach the immortality 
or indestructibility of any thing connected with man 
by nature. The very opposite is true of the text, for 
the exhortation is, fear not them which kill the body, 
but are not able to kill the soul; but fear him which 
is aUe to destroy both in hell. Wliatever sotily here, 
means, the fact is expressed that, though men cannot 
kill or destroy it, God ca7i. Since, then, this text un- 
questionably teaches that God can kill the soul, what- 
ever is here meant by the term, the question arises, 
will He under any circumstances do so ? The language 
of Jesus certainly implies that God is not only able to do 



34 



MAK KOT IMMOETAL. 



it, but that He will do it. To the question there can 
be but one reply. Scripture testimony is too plain 
to admit of doubt. " The soul that sinneth, it shall 
die.'^ " Oh/^ says the objector, "this is spiritual death.^^ 
Far from it. The yerb shall, in the text, makes the 
death threatened to the sinning soul an event future to 
the act of sin, whereas the act of transgression, and the 
introduction of what is denominated spiritual death 
must of necessity happen cotemporaneously. 

Latter-day theologians contend that the soul is im- 
mortal, indestructible. If this were so then God Himself 
could not destroy it any more than could man. To 
meet this objection, it is asserted that deMroy has not in 
this text its usual signification, but is used tropically. Is 
it so? Then how may we know that ^^^7Z, soul, lody, 
fear are not also thus used ? To urge that these terms 
are here used in a figurative sense would be to insist 
that the text teaches nothing: and yet it would be 
no more unreasonable to affirm they are used tropically 
than it is to so afiirm of destroy. It should have been 
frankly said, "the term destroy cannot just here bear 
its usual signification without doing great violence to 
our theory." Of course it cannot. Give it just as literal 
an interpretation as is claimed for every other word in 
the text, and it will do for the popular theory what 
Jesus affirmed men can only do to the creature, viz., 
Mil it. 

Pursuing the assumption that destroy was used 
by Jesus, in this instance, figuratively, the idea being 
that one can render soul and body utterly miserable in 
the theological hell, some commentators and others have 
taken the position that satan is the " him " referred to 



REVIEW OF "EEY. D. GEORGE/^ 35 

as able to do this. In this they are consistent. They do 
not charge God with rendering beings miserable in hell : 
no, they haye it that He at the judgment consigns 
them to that abode, and '*his satanic majesty" does 
the rest. Those portions of God's word, however, which 
testify to the final destruction of both hell and devil, 
are not in high favor with any of these eternal tor- 
mentists. Among those who have taken the position 
just mentioned, and have finally concluded it was satan 
that was said to be able to destroy soul and body, are 
Drs. Lange, Stier and others. Dr. Lange, however, sub- 
sequently changed his mind, and openly so avowed. 

Oar Saviour was speaking to his disciples, his 
"friends.'^ He exhorted them to faithfulness in pro- 
claiming the truth, under all circumstances, not per- 
mitting any fear of bodily injury to interfere with or 
prevent the prosecution of the work assigned them. He 
adds : 

"Fear not them who apoMeinonton^ murder (in the 
sense of cutting to pieces) the soma^ body, but cannot 
apoMeinai^ (in the sense of utterly destroy) the 
psitclie, soul or being ; but rather fear him who is able 
apolesai, to destroy both {psucJie and so?7ia) body and 
being, in Gehenna. The meaning undoubtedly is, that 
wicked men can only destroy the present being of the 
righteous, and that God could raise them up again; but 
if they apostatized to save their present lives, that God 
was able — which implies that He would do it — to des- 
troy their entire being in Gehenna.^' — BiMe vs. Tradi' 
Hon. 

Jesus had said to them — "Take no thought for your 
life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink; nor 
yet for your body, what ye shall put on." — Matt. vi. 25. 



36 



MA^T XOT IMMOKTAL. 



The word here rendered life is the same {psiicTie) tliat 
is rendered soul in x. 28. Vv'hat determined the ren- 
dering of it life in the one case, and soul in the other?. 
Would it have been done had there been no soul-entity 
theory to serve? The reader cannot fail to perceive 
the true state of the case. Again: Christ said to the 
disciples, He that findeth his life, (^psuclie) shall lose 
it: and he that loseth his life for my sake 

shall find \iP — x. 39. Here is much the same senti- 
ment expressed as in x. 28. 

Yet again: ^'For whosoever will save his life shall 
lose it; and whosoever will lose his life for my sake 
shall find it. For what is a man profited, if he gain 
the whole Vforld, and lose his own soul?^^ — Matt, xvi* 
25, 26. Dr. Adam Clarke here remarks that he knows 
not on what authority many have translated the Greek 
term life in verse 25, and soul in verse 26 : ^-but,'^ says 
he, " I am certain it means life in both places.'^ Since 
the translators desired to have it soul in the last verse, 
why did they not so render it in the first ? The reason 
is obvious. They did not like the looks of a text which 
would express the possibility of a man losing his soiil 
for Christ's sake. Had they put it life in both verses 
the reading would have been consistent and sensible 
throughout; for what luould it profit any man, if he 
should gain the whole world and lose his life ? or what 
would a man give in exchange for his life 9 However 
the terms are rendered they make sad havoc with Mr. 
George's theory. He says the soul is the man, con- 
sequently the text as it stands represents the possibility 
of a soul losing its soul ; and if a soul possesses a soul, 
why may not the soul possessed possess a soul, and so 



RETIEVY OF EEY. K. D. GEORGE.'' 37 

on ad infinitum. On the other hand, if life be put in 
place of sou], as Clarke insists, then the difnculty is 
increased, for his real man, being immortal, can only 
die a spiritual death," and Christ is thus made to 
urge his disciples to a willingness to " lose the life of 
God," to enter a "condition of sin and wretched- 
ness" for his sake. What a wretched theory that must 
be which is ever floating upon the surface of such ab- 
surdities. It is lamentable indeed that rational men 
are willing to grope about in that kind of darkness. 

A fact w^hich we feel confident will not be denied 
by any well-informed person is, that the righteous are 
in the ISTew Testament said to have a life which the un- 
righteous are not said to have. In recognition of this 
the term " sleep " is frequently used with reference to 
the righteous dead, but it is never used with reference 
to the wicked dead. Understand, we speak of the. I^ew 
Testament. Says Dr. Lange — " The designation ' sleep ' 
is used in the ISTew Testament to denote the death of 
believers only." 

Another fact is that believers obtain /;hrough Jesus 
the principle of the resurrection. This 13 fully con- 
ceded by some orthodox commentators. Paul remark- 
ed: "But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus 
from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ 
from the dead shall also quicken your mortal bodies 
by his Spirit that dwelleth in you." — Eom. viii. 11. 
The marginal reading lor " by," in the text, is lecause 
of: and this reading is so well supported by MSS., that 
best critics adopt it, among them the translators of the 
Amerioak Bible XJkio^t. Dr. Hodge says of it — " The 
meaning is that the indwelling of God's Spirit is the 



38 



MA^ 2sOT IMMOETAL. 



ground or reason why believers are not left in the 
grave/^ The mind cannot conceive just how the in- 
dwelling of God's Spirit is the ground or reason why 
believers are not left in deaths nor just what is that life 
in recognition of the existence of which the righteous 
dead are said, by New Testament writers, to "sleep/^ but 
we do know, because inspiration informs us, that the 
result, the effect is resurrection from the dead. We 
conceive it to be precisely this kind of life or leing 
which is meant in Matt. x. 28. 

When Christ said, whosoever will lose his life for 
my sake shall find it^^ (life), he had reference, as none 
Will deny, to two hinds of life. Enemies of Christ are 
able to kill the natural life of believers, but that which 
shall be found is a spiritual life which they shall 
receive by being raised '^up at the last day.^^ Of course 
Christ's people do not have that life in its reality while 
the natural life is possessed, but they do have it as a 
seed or life-principle, and although they may be 
killed and given to the burning flame it will still exist 
and God will give them a life, by a resurrection from 
the dead, in full and glorious reality Iccaiise of its ex- 
istence. Therefore, believers should not fear them 
which kill the soma, body, take away its life, but are not 
able to kill the jpsiiclie, life, which they possess by 
virtue of a living union with Christ: but they should 
rather fear him who is able and will be likely, should 
they forsake Christ and the gospel to save their present 
or natural life, to c7^5Z^;'6>?/ Soz^/^, giving them no resurrec- 
tion from the dead. Says Luke, xii. 4, 5 : " Be not 
afraid of them that kill the body/' (destroy the natural 
life) " and after that have no more that they can do. 



EEVIEW OF ^^KEY. N". D. GEOr.GE.'^ 39 

But I will forewarn you whom ye shall fear : Fear him, 
which after he hath killed hath power to cast into hell/^ 
{gelmi7ia,) where he will destroy you utterly. 

Harwood renders Matt. x. 28, " Fear not those who 
can inflict npon you bodily pain and torture, and de- 
prive you of a precarious being— but whose power ex- 
tends no further. But let that great Being be the object 
of your fear, who can involve both soul and body in 
total and everlasting destruction. Let that great 
Being, I repeat it, be the object of your constant fear.'' 

"Every reasonable person must perceive that psuclie 
means a person's self. The learned know that Mat- 
thew — who probably wrote his gospel in Hebrew, uses 
a great many Heireiu idioms. Thus we find that Luke 
often explains Matthew. It was customary for the He- 
brews to use the expressions, my soul, your soul, in- 
stead of the reflective pronouns, myself, yourself, etc.'' 
— BiUe vs. Tradition, 

It is evident that all the gospel writers understood a 
man's soul to be himself, not a fancied something 
within him capable of being separated from him. Not 
only is this so, but it cannot be proved that any mem- 
ber of the Christian church believed otherwise for at 
least the first hundred years — it would be safe to name 
a longer period — of its existence. The popular theory 
of man's nature was introduced into the church at a 
much later period, as will in due time be^shown. 

" Gr., fear not from those apoMeinonton to soma, but 
psuclie not being able aiooMeinai ; but fear rather 
that (him that) being able Tcai, both, the psuclie Icai, • 
and, the soma apolesai en geenne. The verb apokteino, 
of which apohtGinonton is the participle, and apoh^ 



40 



MAi^ IsOT IMMORTAL. 



teinai tlie infinitiye, is defined by the Hederici Lex- 
icon, interficio, defined by Ainsworth, to kill, put to 
death, destroy, consume, occido, defined by AinsTvorth, 
to be extinguished, to die, to be slain, to perish, to 
be lost, to be wasted, and perino, defined by Ains- 
worth, to take away wholly, destroy, ruin, deface, to 
kill, slay. . . . AjJoUumi, of which ajjolesai (the other 
verb used in the yerse,) is the infinitive, is defined by 
the Hederici Lex., perdo, vasto, 2^ereo, disperdo, to 
abolish, to waste, to cause to be lost, to perish, to be 
annihilated: the reader has already had the meaning of 
the last three of these yerbs. . . . The reader per- 
ceiyes, that aiooJesai, applied in the yerse to lotli the 
psuche and tiie soria, is a much stronger word to express 
utter extinction than the yerb apoMeino^ applied in the 
yerse to soma. If among the definitions of apoktei- 
no, we take Icill, then the Greek of Matt. x. 28 will 
be, . . . fear not from those killing the soma, {L e,, 
the living person, for the body without j^^z^c/ze, breath, 
life, cannot be killed,) but the psuclie, breath, life, 
{psiiclie is here used Icat exoclien, by way of eminence, 
for breath, life, from the dead) not being able to kill ; 
but fear rather that (him that) being able both the 
Ijsuclie and the soma (2. e., the entire being) to abolish, 
waste, destroy totally, cause to be lost, to perish, be an- 
nihilated in geennaP — Theology of the Bible, 

All will surely perceive, we think, that the psuche, 
(rendered soul) life, which Jesus affirmed men cannot 
kill, is something peculiar to the believer, and possessors 
of it are warned against disobedience, or in any way 
whatever seeking to save their natural life at the ex- 
pense of the precious faith committed to them, lest, 
offending him who is able to destroy the ichole being, 
they be not raised from the dead to everlasting life and 
glory. To deny the truth, knowing, or believing it to be 



EEYIEW OP "EEY. D. GEOPwGE/^ 



41 



such, is to deny Ckrist, and he has said, '^whoso- 
eyer shall deny me before men, him will I also deny 
before my Father which is in heaven/^ To be renounced 
by Christ, is to haye him neither for a mediator nor 
Saviour. To so apostatize as to be thus separated from 
Christ, the Liee-giyee, the "author of eternal life,'^ 
the "resurrection and the life,^' is to be destroyed 
utterly. If a man sacrifice his life for God, it is not 
lost, for God will give him, the mauy a future life in 
infinite glory. 

That part of the text. Matt. x. 28, which, rightly un- 
derstood, positively prohibits the interpretation insist- 
ed on by Mr. George and others, we haye hitherto re- 
frained from noticing. It is the expression, " in helL^^ 
The word rendered hell, is gelienna. It occurs twelye 
times in the received Greek text, and is translated liell 
in every place. It is not itself a Greek word, but is 
simply the Grecian method of spelling the Hebrew 
words which are translated " The Valley of Hinnom.^^ 

" Parkhurst considers that as the Septuagint trans- 
late, or rather spell in Greek letters, without translating 
gee or gai, a valley, and Hinnom, a man^s name, in Job 
xyiii. 16, by Gaihenna, so the Gehenna of the N". T. is 
in like manner a corruption of the same Hebrew words. 
Gee, a valley, and Hinnom, the person vdio was once 
the possessor of it. So we may consider the word as 
Hebrew with nothing of Greek about it, except the 
spelling. Our translators have no more authority for 
translating gelienna by lull, than they would haye had 
for translating Sodom or Gomorrah, Tiell. All critics are 
agreed upon the origin of the word. 

The yalley of Hinnom was a delightful yale planted 
with trees, watered by fountains on the south-east of 
Jerusalem, by the torrent Kedron. Here the idolatrous 



43 



MAK IsOT IMMOETAL. 



kings of Judah placed the brazen image of Moloch. 
The idolatrous Jews were accustomed to sacrifice, not 
only doYes, rams, calves, and bulls, but often their own 
children. . . . The pious king Josiah caused it to be 
polluted, and made a place of desecration, of loathing, 
and horror. There were cast all kinds of filth, to- 
gether with the carcasses of beasts, and the unburied 
criminals who had been executed. Continual fires 
were necessary, in order to consume these; and there 
worms were always feeding on the remaining relics.^^ — 
B. vs. T. 

The author of Theologt of the Bible, after re- 
marking upon the use of the word in the various ver- 
sions, says: 

" Our orthodox editors give in the margin a note to 
the E. V. words, the valley of Hinnom, in Josh. xv. 8, 
thus, ' Memorable for the worship of the idol Moloch 
with human sacrifice; and as having given occasion to 
the New Testament name for the place of future punish- 
ment, Gehenna.^ Thus early in the Bible do our 
orthodox editors say to the readers of the note, that 
Gelienna in the New Testament is a name, and a name 
for orthodoxy's place of future punishment. But the 
Eheims version, and James' orthodox ecclesiastics, have 
not ventured once to use the word Gehenna in their 
version of the K T. It was so plain that the Gr. 
geenna, Lat., gelienna, Ital., geenna, of the New Tes- 
tament was the valley of Hinnom of the Old Testa- 
ment, that they entirely avoided the word gelienna.^' 

Let us further examine concerning gehenna, valley of 
Hinnom. "What is its locality? In Josh, xv. 8, we 
find the situation of the lot of Judah described as fol- 
lows: "And the border went up by the valley of the 
son of Hinnom unto the south side of the Jebusite; 
the same is Jerusalem : and the border went up to the 



REVIEW OF "KEY. ]Sr. D. GEORGE." 



43 



top of the mouDtain that lieth before the valley of 
Hinnom westward, which is at the end of the valley of 
the giants northward/' In chap, xviii. 16, we find the 
inheritance of Benjamin described thus : " And the 
border came down to the end of the mountain that 
lieth before the valley of tlie son of Hinnom, and 
which is in the valley of the giants on the north, and 
descended to the valley of Hinnom, to the side of 
Jebusi on the south, and descended to En-rogel." In 
the word of the Lord commanding Jeremiah to warn 
his disobedient people of evil that should come upon 
them unless they repented, we find the following : . " And 
go forth unto the valley of the son of Hinnom, which is 
by the entry of the east gate, and proclaim there the 
words that I shall tell thee." — Jer. xix. 2. 

Is it true that this once beautiful valley became the 
scene of awful abominations ? " Moreover, he" (Ahaz) 
"burnt incense in the valley of the son of Hinnom, 
and burnt his children in the fire, after the abominations 
of the heathen, whom the Lord had cast out before the 
children of Israel." — 2 Chron. xxviii. 3. Also xxxiii. 
6 : " And he " (Manasseh) " caused his children to pass 
through the fire in the valley of the son of HinnomP 
"And he" (Josiah) "defiled Topheth which is in the 
valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might 
make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to 
Moloch." — 2 Kings xxiii. 10. 

Kitto says of Hinnom : " When Josiah overthrew 
this idolatry, he defiled the valley by casting into it the 
bones of the dead, the greatest of all pollutions among 
the Hebrews ; and from that time it became the com- 
mon jakes of Jerusalem, into which all the refuse of 



44 



MAK KOT IMMORTAL. 



tlie city was cast, and where the combustible portions 
were consumed by fire/^ Prof. Stuart remarks concern- 
ing itt "The pious king Josiah, caused it to be pollut- 
ed, i. e., he caused to be carried there the filth of the 
city of Jerusalem • . . Perpetual fires were kept up in 
order to consume the off*al which was deposited there, 
and as the same offal would breed worms, (for all 
putrifying meat of course does,) hence came the 
expression, ^ where their worm dieth not, and the fire is 
not quenched.^ 

This valley became a place of punishment. " For the 
children of Judah have done evil in my sight, saith 
the Lord: they have set their abominations in the 
house which is called by my name, to pollute it. And 
they have built the high places of Tophet, which is in 
the valley of tlie son of Hin7iom, to burn their sons and 
their daughters in the fire; which I commanded them 
not, neither came it into my heart. Therefore, be- 
hold, the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall no 
more be called Tophet, nor the valley of the son of 
Hinnom, but the valley of slaugliter ; for they shall 
bury in Tophet till there be no place,^^ — Jer. vii. 30-32. 
In chap. xix. the above is substantially repeated ; and 
it is added: "I will make void the counsel of Judah 
and Jerusalem in this place; and I will cause them to 
fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the 
hands of them that seek their lives ; and their carcasses 
will I give to be meat for the fowls of heaven, and for 
the beasts of the earth.^^ 

Much other testimony might be adduced to prove 
that Geliemia, the valley of Hinnom was formerly a 
place of punishment by fire, etc., and certain portions 



BEYIEW OP "EEY. K ^ GEOEGE." 45 

of Scripture indicate that it may again be a place of 
punishment by fire or otherwise unto destruction. It 
is not, however, anywhere intimated that it is a place 
where the wicked are being punished at the present time, 
nor that any wicked ones will eyer be long kept aliye in 
it. To assert that they will be is to speak against God, 
for He has called the place. The Valley of Slaugliter, 

I will also gather all nations, and will bring them 
down into the valley of J ehoshaphat, and will plead 
with them there for my people and for my heritage 
Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and 
parted my land.^^ — Joel iii. 2. The valley of Jehoshaphat 
lies on the east of Jerusalem, and is called the valley 
of judgment. Jehoshaphat, it is said, we presume truly, 
means " The Lord Judge." If this prophecy of Joel 
relates to events yet future, then Mr. Eead well observes : 
" As the feet of Christ are to stand on the Mount of 
Olives ' in tliat day^ we can perceive, that as the moun- 
tains rise behind, his face will be toward Jerusalem; 
and if the nations are gathered before him, in the valley 
of Jehoshaphat, Gelienna will be on his left hand; and 
there probably many of the wicked will be consumed 
with fire from Heaven,^^ In such an event Gehenna will 
be a place of future punishment. If this be so, w^ill 
the fires of Gehenna be eternal? There is no pass- 
age of Scripture which teaches any such thing. 

If we except the one instance of its use by James, 
and it is questionable whether it is really the word 
James used, Jesus is the only one who ever made use of 
the term Gehenna, in the whole New Testament, and 
he only used it in speaking to Jews. It wag familiar 
to them, not only as a place where human sacrifices 



46 



MAK is^OT IMMOETAL. 



were at one time offered; but also as a place of pun- 
ishment by deatli^ we may fairly presume, since tlieir 
Scriptures speak of it as such. They were familiar with 
it, too, as the place where the offal of the city was 
thrown, as also not unfrequently the dead persons of 
malefactors, and where fires were kept constantly burn- 
ing to destroy whatever was thrown there. They es- 
teemed a denial of burial one of the very greatest of in- 
dignities, Solomon says, if a man "have no burial, 
an untimely birth is better than he.'^ In addressing the 
Jews, therefore, no stronger expression could be used 
to represent extinction of ieing, nor one better calculated 
to be so understood than being cast into Geliennay 
valley of Hinnom, or gehenna fire. As nothing cast 
there ever came out alive, but was wholly consumed^ 
for what the fire did not burn, the worms destroyed, 
so when gelienna punishment was threatened they well 
knew it meant utter destruction. 

Another fact must not be overlooked. Christ 
sometimes used the term Gelienna in denouncing judg- 
ments against wicked Jews. The following is an in- 
stance: '^Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how 
can ye escape the damnation of hell (Gehenna.) — 
Matt, xxiii. 33. The word translated "damnation,'^ is 
IcriseoSy meaning judgment. The text more properly 
rendered, would read, " Ye serpents, ye generation of 
vipers, how can ye escape the judgment of {gelienna) 
the valley of Hinnom ? Gehenna, valley of Hinnom, is 
here-named as the place of punishment of those wick- 
ed Jews, and the punishment was, of course, then 
future. Jesus said unto them : " Wherefore, behold, I 
send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: 



KEYIEW OF "REV. D. GEORGE/^ 47 

and some of tbein ye shall kill and crucify ; and some 
of them ye shall scourge in your synagogues, and 
persecute them from city to city: that upon you may 
come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from 
the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias 
ison of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and 
the altar. Verily I say unto you, all these things 
shall come upon this generation/^ — Matt, xxiii. 3-4, 35, 
36. "And when ye^^ (believers) "shall see Jerusa- 
lem compassed with armies, then know that the des- 
olation thereof is nigh. Then let theni^^ (believers) 
"which are in Judea flee to the mountains; and let 
them which are in the midst of it depart out; and let 
not them that are in the countries enter thereinto. 
Tor these be the days of vengeance, that all things w^hich 
are written may be fulfilled.^^ — Luke xxi. 20, 21, 22. 
All this refers directly to the judgment in Matt, xxiii, 
33. 

The Jews certainly filled the measure of their 
fathers. They scourged, stoned, killed and crucified 
believers: they persecuted followers of Christ beyond 
measure. Such were well worthy of the judgment of 
the valley of Hinnom, Forty years later that judg- 
ment came; and how terrible was it! The city sur- 
rounded by the minions of Titus ; anarchy, starvation, 
death, horrors of every description reigning within, 
the scenes then witnessed no pen can ever describe. 
So literally did the streets run with blood that fires 
were extinguished by it. More than eleven hundred 
thousand Jews lay, buried and unburied, about the 
city. They did not escape the judgment of the valley 
of Hinnom, Indignation and wrath came upon them 



48 



MA^q" KOT IM3I0ETAL, 



to the utiermost. Then did it transpire that men looked 
upon the carcasses of them that transgressed against 
the Lord^ where their worm did not die, and where 
their fire was not quenched. That was the judgment 
that was nigh at the time Christ threatened the Jews, 
believers, if faithless, and unbelievers, with gehenna 
punishment. That was the punishment inflicted upon 
the disobedient and faithless of that generation. 

Modern theology would have the text under con- 
sideration teach what they to whom the language was 
addressed could never have understood it to mean. It 
would have the expression destroy both soul and body in 
Gehenna, to mean that God will keep alive what it 
calls the immortal soul, in what it is pleased to call 
liell, until the resurrection, and that then He will keep 
alive both body and soul in the same place, and delight 
Himself in torturing them to all eternity. Who does 
not see from what has been said, that nothing could 
well be imagined which would be more foreign to the 
meaning of Christ's words, or more at variance with 
his teachings. What a perversion is it of the word of 
God ! What blasphemy against God ! 

The nature and effect of punishment in Gehenna, 
the whole consequence of being cast there, whether 
dead or alive, was so* well understood among the Jews, 
that it came to be recognized as well by other peoples 
round about, among whom it became a sort of familiar 
saying when threatening the greatest punishment. Il- 
lustrative of this is the following circumstance, which, 
occurred lorg after the death of Christ. 

In the early experience of Mahomet, as a prophet, 
so called, he had no more bitter and ",j}relenting enemy 



REVIEW OF '^EEV. IS". D. GEORGE.'* 49 

than was liis uncle Abu Lahab. Thongli subsequently 
a most faithful Mahomedan, he for some years lost 
•no opportunity to oppose and persecute the prophet. 
When the time came for Mahomet, as he believed, to 
"announce publicly and boldly his doctrine, beginning 
with his kindred and tribe/' he summoned all the 
Koreishites of the line of Haschem to meet him on the 
hill of Safa, in the vicinity of Mecca, when he would 
unfold matters important to their welfare. They as- 
sembled there, as requested, and among them was 
Mahomet's hostile uncle, Abu Lahab. When the proph- 
et had fairly begun to discourse of his mission, and 
make known his revelations, Abu Lahab started up in 
a rage, upbraided him for calling them together for 
such a purpose, and catching up a stone would have 
hurled it at him. Mahomet turned upon the disturber, 
cursed the hand thus impiously raised, and predicted his 
destruction in the fire of Jeliennom; with the assurance 
that his wife, 0mm Jemil, would bear the bundle of 
thorns with which the fire would be kindled. 

Of course the fact that had Mahomet understood 
any thing of a theological hell, he must have remem- 
bered that its fire of everburning brimstone would be 
quite sufficient to accomplish the purpose without the 
addition of a few fagots borne thither by the scoffer's 
wife, forbids the thought that any reference was had to 
such a place, and settles it that he simply used an ex- 
pression of Jewish origin to convey the idea of punish- 
ment by burning to death. 

Dr. Eichard Watson, writing on Mark ix., where 
Gehenna is several times mentioned in connection with 
3 



50 



3IA]^ XOT IMXOETAL. 



the expressions, their worm dieth not, and the fire is 
not quenched/^ says: 

"As the worm itself dies not, biit destroys that it 
feeds upon, and as fire unqnenched consumes that 
upon which it kindles, so when temporal judgments 
are expressed by this phrase the utter destruction of 
persons, cities, and nations appears to be intended/^ 

In the Targum is the following paraphrase of Psa. 
xxxviii. 20 : " They shall be consumed in the smoke of 
Gehenna/^ 

"The early Christian writers plainly understood 
our word ' destroy ^ in its literal and ordinary sense. 
Tertullian paraphrases the passage (Matt. x. 28,) thus : 
^ Who is able to kill and destroy (occidere et perdere) 
both soul and body/ And Cyprian: ^Who can slay 
(occidere) both soul and body/ Likewise Jerome and 
^.ugustine. And Origen says: ^Who is able to des- 
troy and blot out both soul and body, either in Gehenna 
or as he may choose/ And not only do the other terms 
used require the literal sense of the word ^destroy/ 
but the reason of the case demands it. Christ was Uhe 
faithful and true witness/ And would he give his 
most solemn warning in ambiguous terms? The or- 
dinary sense of the words plainly name an indefinite 
less — the loss of being, and of eternal life; the literal 
loss of the soul. The same faithful witness elsewhere 
reminds us that to gain the whole world and lose 
the soul is a foolish exchange. Did he here expect us 
to understand that the soul is imperishable, that it can 
never be strictly lost, but that we have something infin- 
itely worse to fear ? ' Endless annihilation,^ says the 
younger Edwards, 'is an endless ot infinite punishment;' 
and the ordinary sense of Christ's words denotes extinc- 
tion. Did he mean a two-fold infinitude of punish- 
ment ? " — Prof. Hudson. 



REVIEW OF "KEY. 1^. D. GEORGE." 51 

Augustine says, "The soul can die, it can be slain.'* 
*^If the soul cannot be slain, how should our Lord, 
warning us, say, ^ Fear Him ? ' " 

We think we haye heretofore suflBciently shown 
what the soul is. If "Rev.'' Mr. George does, others, we 
feel assured, will not fail to see that the text so con- 
fidently relied on by himself and other believers in 
inherent immortality is, rightly understood and reas- 
onably interpreted, an unanswerable argument against 
the theory. May our blessed Lord help all his peo- 
ple to rightly understand it and, understanding it, so 
justly appreciate the truth it teaches that they will 
eyer be preserved from grossly misrepresenting the char- 
acter of God by attributing to him acts of most fiendish 
cruelty. 

"What but cruelty of the most unrelenting and ma- 
lignant type could keep helpless beings in endless tor- 
ture with no view to either their improvement or as 
warning to others. Such a proceeding could not be 
had for purposes of benefit to the tortured ones, since 
it is held that their suflFerings are to be eternal ; neither 
could it serve as a warning to others, for it is contended 
that when the damned begin to receive their torture in 
its full intensity time will have ended, and probation 
closed. Who can believe such a doctrine, and at the 
same time, bowing before the throne of grace, confident- 
ly lift the voice in solemn praise and adoration, saying, 
" Thou who art a God of Love, and whose tender mer- 
cies are over all thy works?" May all patrons of 
the torment theory diligently consider these things, 
prayerfully striving to weigh them well, to weigh them 
with the care and intelligence their immeasurable im- 
portance demands. 



52 



We have just received from Thomas Eead, author of 
Bible vs. Teaditio:^^-, a note which contains the follow- 
ing: 

" The Eey. 'N. D. George must haye been driven to 
a very embarrassing perplexty when he founded one of 
his chief arguments against annihilation upon the am- 
biguous meaning of the phrase ^soul and body/ in such 
a text as Matt. x. 28, which fairly implies that in the 
event of apostacy, that God could and would {apolesia) 
annihilate both soul and body, whatever ^soul and body^ 
may mean, in Gahenna, or valley of Hinnom, the place 
of capital punishment. Matthew, taken from the Cus- 
tom House, wishes to write a history of Christ, soon after 
the death of Christ, to the J ews among whom all the 
facts of his history and genealogy were known. Shall 
he write it in the vernacular of the Jews ? No. For 
supposing that language to be the Chaldee-Syriac, al- 
though allied to the Hebrew, it was then a living lan- 
guage, and in the absence of printing, liable to great al- 
terations, and his people were soon to be scattered 
among the nations, and would not long remember this 
language. As the learned Jews were r'all acquainted 
with the Hebrew, which being a dead language, and 
therefore unalterable, it seems, at that time, more suita- 
ble than the Greek, which was not at the time much 
understood among the inhabitants of Judea, as the best 
medium for his gospel. That Matthew did write his 
gospel in the Hebrew language is the universal belief of 
antiquity. 

It is a curious fact, bearing heavily upon the present 
oontrovery, which we commend to the attention of Eev. 
]sr, D. and his coadjutors, that the Hebrew language has 
no word equivalent to the Greek word soma or English 
word tody, but the word neplies\ soul; which word, 
neplicsli, Vvas uniformly made to express psiiclie^ soma, 
soul and lody. Turn to a concordance of the Old Tes- 



REVIEW or "KEY. K. D. GEORGE.'' 53 

tament and where the word iody occurs, it is nepliesli in 
the HebreW;, except in one case, where it means carcase. 
As the Hebrews anciently knew no distinction between 
nepliesli^ psiiclie, soma, soul and lody, so they needed no 
other word than nej^hesli, soul, to express all these terms. 
The Hebrew Scripture writers all wrote upon the theory 
of the unity of man ; and as nepliesli meant a breathing 
frame-work, it ^answered all their purposes. Translate 
the Greek of Matt. x. 28 into Hebrew, and that Hebrew 
into English, and it Y/ould read: ^Fear not those that 
can kill the soul, but are not able to destroy the soul: 
but rather fear him who is able to annihilate both soul 
and soul in the valley of Hinnom.^ Now as Matthew 
did not write the last clause of this verse in this man- 
ner, we cannot learn from the present Greek text, the 
exact words that Matthew did use, although Luke xii. 
4, 5, clearly expresses the sense.'^ 

The frequency with which Mr. George seeks refuge 
in Matt. X. 28 is strongly suggestive of a willingness on 
liis part to place the issue of the controversy respecting 
annihilation on a single text. If this be so then, in- 
stead of the one he has selected, Matt. x. 28, which though 
ambiguous in the use of the phrase soul and body,'' is 
manifestly opposed to the popular theory, we commend 
him to the unambiguous text. Acts iii. 23: ^^And it 
shall come to pass that every soul which will not hear 
that prophet shall be destroyed " (or utterly annihilated) 
"from among the people." Matt. x. 28 says, " God ia 
able to destroy the soul ; " but this text, Acts iii. 23, ^ 
clearly and emphatically declares that God loill utterly 
destroy the soul that will not hear Jesus. Surely the 
directness and, unambiguity of the latter text entitles it 
to preference if any isolated passage is to be regarded as 
settling the question. 



54 



MAi^ KOT IMMORTAL. 



CHAPTEE III. 
Paul's hope. 

" And liaye liope toward God, wliicli they themselves also al- 
low, that there shall be a resurrection of the dead, both of the just 
and unjust." — Acts xxiv, 15. 

Every thoiiglitful reader of A^t^^'IHIlatiokism ^n^ot 
OF THE Bible, must wonder what could have induced, 
the author to devote a number of pages of his book 
to this text. Did he suppose his work could fall into 
the hands of any one so ignorant as not to know that 
nothing can by any possibility whatever be found in 
the text that can be tortured into so much as the re- 
motest intimation that the wicked will not all be lit- 
erally destroyed? What object could a person, writing 
against the plain, unqualified testimony of inspiration, 
that all the Avicked will He " (God) " destroy,'' have 
in view in giving so much space to the text ? It is dif- 
ficult to imagine any good reason. 

Does the author himself believe there will be a '^res- 
urrection of the dead, both of the just and unjust?'^ 
His theory prohibits it. Are we asked how that can 
be ? " Who believes that corpses are men ? They are 
only the remains of men.'' So says Mr. George, as we 
have before noticed. The body, then, is no part of the 
man proper, and cannot, as a matter of course, be either 
holy or unholy. The immaterial soul is the man, just 
or unjust, as the case may be, consequently neither the 
just nor the unjust can have a resurrection from the 
dead, for neither of them die, except what he calls a 
spiritual death, and if he admits the unjust are to have 



REVIEW OF ^'REY. D. GEORGE." 55 

a future resurrection from such a state, he becomes in- 
volved in precisely what he severely denounces, viz.j 
Universalism. Unless marvellously inconsistent, he 
must acknowledge that his theory precludes his believ- 
ing what he aflfirms to be the assertion of Paul. 

It is true that the text seems^ at first glance^ to be out 
of harmony with Paul's teachings generally, and to in- 
dicate the resurrection of the impenitent dead. As Mr. 
G. thinks it is a strong passage against the position that 
the righteous only will live again, we give it some atten- 
tion. It will not be denied that upon the words of the 
dead, in the text, depends very much of the strength of 
what argument it is made to furnish in support of the 
theory of a resurrection of all mankind. Although the 
use of the definite article does not necessarily imply a 
reference to aZZ the dead, as being subjects of the res- 
urrection, it is nevertheless suggestive of the thought 
that they may all be meant. 

If, however, Paul not only did not use the article, 
but also used neither of the words of the dead, then 
the language of the text cannot justly be thought to 
contain even an intimation that more than a part of the 
dead are referred to. Dr. Lange, together with the num- 
ber of commentators by whom his Commentary is trans- 
lated from the German, and edited, with additions, 
leave out the words in question. Other learned Bible 
students do the same. Dr. Alexander intimates that 
they should be left out of the text, and he does leave the 
article out of verses 7 and 8, of chap, xxvi., the first re- 
lating to Jews, and the latter to " dead." 

Did PauFs hope, as expressed in the text, in xxiii. 
6, and in xxvi. 7 embrace a resurrection of all the dead ? 



56 



MAiT NOT IMMORTAL. 



They who hold that the text teaches a universal resurrec- 
tion must contend that it did. Upon such an assump- 
tion, was Paul's assertion, xxiy. 15, that his Jewish ac- 
cusers dlloiued Ids liope^ a justifiable one ? They who so 
maintain will be under the necessity of showing that 
the Jews who made accusation against Paul belieyed 
in the resurrection of all the dead. This they may find 
a somewhat difficult task, for is it not true that the 
Pharisees themselves denied any resurrection whatever 
to some, at least, of the Gentiles, and to the incorrigibly 
wicked of their own people ? What says Dr. Adam 
Clarke on the question? Writing on John vi. 49, 
"Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and 
are dead/' he says — "It was an opinion of the Jews 
themselyes, that their fathers who perished in the 
wilderness, should neyer haye a resurrection. Our Lord 
takes them on their own ground: Ye acknowledge 
that your fathers who fell in the wilderness, shall neyer 
haye a resurrection; and yet they ate of the manna: 
therefore that manna is not the bread that preserves to 
everlasting life, according to your own concession.'' 

It will at once be seen that if Paul hoped for a resur- 
rection of all men, and the Jews did not believe all mcM 
would be raised from the dead, then they did not 
" allow *' his hope. But if Paul, preaching, as he did, 
Jesus and the resurrection, believed in the re-living of 
those only who fell asleep in Christ, and the Jews held- 
to a resurrection of two classes among their own people, 
viz., the just and unjust, then they did "allow" his 
^hope. They could not otherwise be said to allow his 
hope unless, indeed, it be held that he believed just as 
they did as to who would be subjects of the resurrec- 



REVIEW OF "EEY. I?". D. GEOKGE." 57 

tion, wliich by no means appears to have been the 
case. The whole weight of Paul's teachings is unques- 
tionably of II different character. For example: "But if 
the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead 
dwell in you, he that raised up Christ from the dead 
shall also quicken your mortal bodies by his Spirit that 
dwelleth in you." — Rom. yiii. 11. Who can read this 
and many like sayings of Paul, and then suppose the 
apostle avowed before Felix that he believed in the res- 
urrection of both just and unjust? The very thought 
is suggestive of absurdity. Do the ungodly have the 
Spirit of God dwelling in them ? The question answers 
itself. 

Dr. Alexander does not find in Acts xxiv. 15 any 
reference to a general resurrection. He says the charac- 
ter oi the hope which Paul "still held in common with 
the unconverted Jews seems to be explained, in the last 
clause, as the hope of a general resurrection. But this 
was not held by the Sadducees, nor is it elsewhere re- 
presented as the great distinctive hope of Israel." 

Says Mr. George, p. 40 of his book, "Paul hoped for 
the resurrection of the deacU If by the dead he means 
all the dead, then upon the authority of Dr. Lange, and 
other editors of the Commentary which bears his name; 
upon the authority of the American Bible Union, and 
also upon the authority of other Greek scholars we con- 
demn the assertion as unfounded in fact, for they say 
the words the dead should not appear in the text. What 
Paul did hope for Avas a resurrection of dead {men). 
Mr. G., as we have seen, does not believe there are any 
dead men to have a resurrection. He differs very wide- 
ly with Paul ; but even if it were hard to decide whicli 



58 



MAl^ KOT IM3I0RTAL. 



is right, we would feel quite justified in giving PauFs 
faith the preference, for that ajjostle certainly has a 
reputation for soundness of doctrine which Mr. G. has 
not just yet succeeded in establishing, nor is he likely to 
succeed while Paul and his doctrines are remembered, 
unless he concludes to make his faith conform to the 
teachings of PaTil. 

He takes up Life prox the dead, turns to p. 45, 
and reads : If the apostle expected the wicked would 
be made alive again, he could hardly desire it. Could 
it be an object of desire to see all the wicked in one 
vast company, weeping, wailing, crying for mercy, and 
mercy deaf to all their sorrows, anguish and despair ? 
Could he desire to listen to the curses and blasphe- 
mies, and witness the rolling sea of wickedness that 
would pour forth from these revived sinners and blasphe- 
mers of all sorts And how, dear reader, do you sup- 
pose this is met ? What argument is brought against 
it ? Why, having read, he casts aside the book, raises 
his hands, apparently, in holy horror, and exclaims, Uni- 
versalist argument ! Pray don't get immoderate, good 
neighbor ; be tranquil. Is the argument any the less 
sound because Universalists have chosen to use it ? Is 
their touch so vile that it contaminates and curses 
everything that is subjected to it ? Truth is truth wher- 
ever found or by whoever held. 

AYe are sorry to trouble Mr. G , and it does seom 

to trouble him, but we must, in common with the au- 
thor of LiEE From the Dead, urge the fact that PauFs 
hope was based on a promise ; for he said, chap, xxvi, 
"I stand and am judged for Ike hope of ilie promise 
made of God unto our fathers." Two things are unde- 



REVIEW OF "REV. I^. D. GEORGE.'^ 



59 



niablytrue; first: the resurrection of the unjust to a 
life of unutterable anguish could not possibly have been 
an object of hope with Paul; second: such a resurrec- 
tion, or a resurrection of such a class to such a state 
could not be considered in any sense d^^promise^ but must, 
if proclaimed at all, have been announced as a threat. 
But the fact is, no such thing is found in the law or the 
prophets, for a resurrection from the dead is uniformly 
spoken of as the privilege of a class. 

Dr. Alexander remarks as follows concerning the last 
clause of verse 7, chap xxvi,^^ For which hope's sake, 
king Agrippa, I am accused of the Jews.'^ 

Of (about, concerning) tvMch liope I am accused (and 
that) by Jews (not the Jews), L by iTien whose whole 
I'eligion rests upon the very hope which they accuse me 
of maintaining. The hope described in this verse can- 
not be that of a general resurrection, which is only 
partially revealed in the Old Testament,'^ (not revealed 
at all, Dr., if by "general resurrection'^ you mean a 
universal one), " and was not held by all the Jews at 
this time." 

Of verse 8, he says. — 

"The reference is plainly to the resurrection of 
Christ, as the crowning proof of his Messiahship, and 
thus the nexus between this ver^^e and the one before it, 
which appeared to be abruptly broken, is completely 
re-established, as if he had said, they believe in a Mes- 
siah, so do I ; but they expect him yet to come, while I 
believe that he is come already, not without grounds or 
on hearsay, but God has identified him by raising him 
from the dead; and surely this, if properly attested, 
cannot be thought by any devout Jev/ to be beyond hi^ 
power.' Bead (not tlie dead) is in Greek a plural, and 
by some explained as a generic form relating to a single 



60 



MAl^" KOT IMMOKTAL. 



person ; but it is rather an allusion to the general res- 
urrection, of which Christ's was the pledge and the 
example/^ 

We have quoted thus from Dr. Alexander to show, 
mainly, that, I'igidly orthodox, so called, as he is, he 
does not find a luiiversal resurrection taught in Acts 
xxiy. 15, and relative passages. " But'' (raise dead) 
is rather an allusion to the general resurrection, of 
which Christ's was the pledge and the example." We 
are pleased to have the Dr. thus plainly tell us what 
he means by general resurrection." The terms em- 
brace those of whose resurrection the resurrection of 
Christ was thej^fec?^^ and the example. We thank the Dr, 
for so much frankness. Of course we must not for a 
mom-cnt entertain the thought that he can give any 
countenance whatever to the idea that the resurrection 
of Christ "was the pledge and the example" of the 
resurrection of the ungodly. Such a thought is too in- 
consistent to find place in his logical mind. 

Says Mr. George, p. 43, Paul " is arraigned for heresy 
concerning the resurrection. He vindicates himself. 
His argument is this : ^ If I am a heretic, then my ac- 
cusers are heretics ; for I believe with them concerniDg 
the resurrection.'" We have already shown that the Jews 
did not believe in a universal resurrection, and if Paul 
did J as is asserted, how could he be said to believe with 
them? If he believed with them, pray tell us on 
what ground he was " called in question" by them ? The 
very fact of his being called in question is proof that 
there was a point of difference between him and them. 
We are led to wonder what can be the limit of our au- 
thor's capacity for error on this subiect. 



EEVIEW OF ^^EEY. l^". D. GEORGE." 61 

Paul preached a resurrection from the dead through 
Jesus. In doing this he preached the resurrection of 
Christ, and that as a pledge and . sample of the resur- 
rection of the faithful. When king Agrippa came to 
Cesarea, Festus stated Paul's case to him, and said that 
when Paul's accusers stood up, they brought none 
accusation of such things as I supposed: but had cer- 
tain questions against him of their own superstition, 
and of one Jesus, which was dead, whom Paul afflrm- 
ed to be aliye." H@re was just the point of contest. 
Paul preached a resurrection of dead (not the dead, re- 
member) through Jesus. He might have preached a 
resurrection of dead men just as much as he liked, and 
they never would have troubled him about it had he not 
made that resurrection conditional, depending upon 
Christ and his resurrection, on the one hand, and faith 
in Christ as the promised Messiah, on the other. They 
had killed Jesus as an impostor, and they denied that 
he was raised from the dead. They wanted to kill Paul ^ 
also for teaching the people that Christ had risen, and 
that as a pledge of the resurrection of somebody else. 

" Of the hope,'^ said Paul, at his examination before 
the chief captain, " and resurrection of dead I am call- 
ed in question.'^ Of what hope, and a resurrection of 
what dead was Paul called in question ? "Why, the res- 
tirrection of the dead Messiah, of course, and the Jiope of 
a resurrection of all whom Christ had promised to raise 
from the dead. And this was the promise that was 
made of God unto the fathers." 

The simple facts, then, are these: The Pharisees 
desired to put Paul " out of the way " because he preach- 
ed the resurrection of Christ, and through him the resur- 



62 



3krA:N" XOT IM^IORTAL. 



rectionof a class. In making coniplaiut against him they 
were compelled, denying, as they did, that Jesus had 
been raised from the dead, to so put the charge as to iu^ 
volve the broad question of a resurrection. This Paul 
was quick to take advantage of by saying, substantial- 
ly to Felix, "I am accused by these Jews of preach- 
ing a resurrection of dead (Christ), and of cherishing 
and proclaiming a hope of a resurrection, yet future, of 
other dead. My hope themselves allow, for they too 
believe there will be a resurrection of dead, not only of 
just but also of unjust.^^ 

" The Greek, as well as the Hebrew, was written 
without points. The E. V. uses the word alloiv with a 
comma after it, and has a resurrection in the nomina- 
tive case, whereas in the Gr., and in the Lat., resurrec- 
tion is in the accusative : and so the E. V., by putting a 
resurreetion in the nominative, was compelled to in- 
sert that there before its words shall le a resurrection. 
K"ow by inserting the true word expect^ instead of al- 
lo2i\ and putting no comma after expect, and striking 
out the E. Y. word the before dead and before just, and 
putting lohich resurrection together, (they agreeing with 
each other in the accusative,) the E. V. verse, without 
filling the ellipsis, will read thus : And have hope to- 
ward God, which resurrection they them.selves (the 
Pharisees) expect shall be of dead, both of just and un- 
just. And this plainly shows that there is an ellipsis 
after the words toward God. And by filling the ellipsis 
(as before) and taking out the comma and the improper 
words used in the E. V., the verse is perfectly plain: 
And have hope toward God, of a resurrection of dead, 
v/hich resurrection they themselves expect shall be 
of dead, both of just and unjust." — Theology of the 
BiUe. 

Jesus warned the disciples. Matt. xvi. 6, saying: 



REVIEW OF "EEV. D. GEOIK^E/^ 63 

" Take heed, and beware of the leaven of the Pharisees 
and of the Salducees." Did he not thus condemn the 
doctrine of both, showing that the Sadducees were 
wrong in saying there will be no resurrection ; and that 
the Pharisees were wrong in saying the unjust will be 
raised ? We think so. The reader will permit us, in re- 
capitulation, to direct attention to some of the points 
which we have fully established. 

First : Paul's Jewish accusers, while they held to a 
resurrection of two classes, just, and unjust, (the latter 
not embracing all the ungodly) of their own people, de- 
nied that certain others would have a resurrection. 

Second : Paul's hope, therefore, could not have em- 
braced all the dead, for had it done so he could not truly 
say that the Pharisees allowed his hope. 

Third: Patrons of the universal resurrection theory 
— and this is true in an eminent degree of Mr. George, 
build their argument almost wholly, so far as relates 
to Acts xxiv. 15, upon the presence in the text of the 
words of the dead, an expression which, as we have abun- 
dantly shown from their own authorities, is not found 
in the original, the Greek, and should not appear in 
the E. V. text. It is significant that the oldest copies of 
the Syriac are without the words rendered ioth of the 
just and unjust. As they are not found in the older 
copies, the question very naturally arises, how came 
they in the later ones ? If they were found in the earlier 
but were wanting in the later ones, we might justly 
conclude they had been accidentally omitted, but it is 
not so easy to explain the matter as it stands. While 
we call attention to the fact, we do not ask that it be re- 
garded as favoring our exposition of the text, for the 



64 



MA^T KOT OIMOKTAL. 



reader has, we think, already seen that to be just, c-:,^!!- 
sistent and Scriptural. 

Fe\y things, it seems to ns, are plainer than that the 
use of the text in question to support the theory of a 
universal resurrection is subyersiye of principles of cor- 
rect exegesis, is a perversion of palpable Scripture testi- 
mony, and is thus, of necessity, highly injurious to the 
interests of truth. 



CHAPTEE lY. 

THE PEKlTE]SrT THIEF. PARADISE. 

** And he said unto Jesus, Lord, remember me when thou 
comest into thy kingdom. And Jesus said unto him, Yerily I 
say unto thee, to-day shalt thou be with me in paradise." — Luke 
xxiii. 42, 43. 

I^^" order to an intelligent examination of these texts? 
it will be necessary to first consider the term paradise^ 
and see whether the current theory, that the word is 
used in the !N"ew Testament to denote the intermediate 
state of the saints, has any foundation in fact, or whether 
it IS a'n assumption merely, having no better object for 
its adoption than the meeting of an emergency. 

Our Eev. author, adopting the popular notion, affirms : 
Paradise is a place of happiness in hades." — P. 117, 
He asserts that the soul of Christ went there. He fur- 
ther says of this place, that " it may be called heaven.'^ 
— P. 190. That it is an easier matter to make assertions 
than to support them by facts or sound logic the above- 
quoted remarks indicate. We will see whether such an 
affirmation concerning ^^a^wZ^^'^e is justifiable. 

The term paradise, Heb., pardes, Gr., paradisos, sig- 



EEVIEW OF "EEV. iT. GEORGE." 61} 

nifies, literally, a garden or pleasure-ground planted 
with trees, flowers, etc. Dr. Adam Clarke, in his notes 
on Gen. ii. 8, states that Wilmet supposes it to be a Per- 
sian word; and the Dr. says, "in AraUc and Persian 
it signifies a garden, a yineyard.'^ The Septuagint ren- 
der Gen. ii. 8, thus, " God planted a paradise in Eden." 
Dr. Albert Barnes says, paradise is a word of Persian 
origin, and means a garden, particularly a garden of 
pleasure, filled with trees, shrubs, fountains and flowers. 
Dr. Owen remarks: 

" The word is a strictly Oriental one, signifying a 
parTc ox pleasicre-ground. The word is used by the Ixx. 
for the'garden of Eden. "Whether it is of Arabic or San- 
scrit origin, is uncertain, and immaterial to the present 
point. It is sufficient that it was a word in universal 
use among the Eastern nations to denote beautiful gar"- 
dens, pleasure-grounds, parks, etc. . . • As the paradise 
in Eden, the primeyal place of beauty and happiness 
had been closed to the human family after the apos- 
tacy, our Lord seems to haye selected this term as ex- 
pressive of the fact, that a higher and more blessed para- 
dise was now to be opened to the race ; that the paradise 
lost was now to be regained, and rendered accessible to 
all, who by faith would so unite themselves to the second 
Adam, as to entitle them to be with him in blessedness 
and glory." 

Whatever the origin of the word, it is certain that 
it was extensively used by various nations in the East. 
Xenophon calls the parks and hunting-grounds of the 
Persian monarchs and nobles, jparadises. 

Just such a garden, a paradise was created by God 
in the beginning, and given to man, conditionally, as 



66 



KAK JSiOT IMMOHTAL. 



his abode. It was a sample of tlie condition to which 
the whole earth would in process of time have been 
brought by Adam and his posterity had man by obedience 
developed a character in harmony with God. '^And 
God blessed them (Adam and Eve) ^'^and God said unto 
them, Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth, 
and siiMue it ; and have dominion over the fish of the sea, 
and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing 
that moveth upon the earth'.^ — Gen. i. 28. 

To a race ec joying Edenic advantages, the whole 
work of subduing the earth and making it like the pat- 
tern furnished by the Creator would have been easy, de- 
lightful and glorious. By disobedience, however, sin en- 
tered, and the curse fell upon man, and upon the ground 
for his sake. Unto Adam God said, " Because thou hast 
hearkened unto the voice of thy wife, and hast eaten of 
the tree of which I commanded thee, saying, Thou shalt 
not eat of it: cursed is the ground for thy sake; in 
sorrow shalt thou eat of it all the days of thy life : thorns 
also and thistles shall it bring forth to thee. ... In the 
sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return 
unto the ground. . . . Therefore the Lord God sent 
him forth from the garden (paradise) ^^of Eden/^ to till 
the ground from whence he was taken." — Gen. iii. 17, 
18, 19, 23. Thus it is seen that when, after the fall, the 
curse was pronounced, the jparadise of Eden ceased to 
be. As it was a pattern or sample of the perfection to 
which the race would, had not sin entered the world, 
have brought the earth, so may it still be regarded as the 
type of what the earth will be, as the inheritance of 
that spiritual race whose head is Christ, the second 
Adam. 



EEVIEW OF ^^EEV. N". D. GEORGE." G7 

Since the fall, there has been no such paradise in ex- 
istence, because the curse has not been removed. The 
two cannot exist together. When there was a paradise, 
as an inheritance of sinless beings, on the earth, there 
was no curse; but when, in consequence of disobedi- 
ence, sin entered the world the curse was pronounced, 
and so while that remains there can be no paradise. If 
it is found that the word of God brings to yiew a time 
when the curse will be remoyed, we may justly belieye 
that paradise will be restored. If in addition to this we 
find inspiration portraying a time of future paradisaic 
peace and glory on the earth, a reasonable exercise of 
faith will grasp it. But if, at last, we find the Holy 
Spirit proclaiming it, and giving visions of its actual 
establishment in heavenly beauty and glory on the earth, 
then we are bound to expect its restoration. The word 
of God does plainly declare that there will come a time 
when there shall be no more curseP 

Nebuchadnezzar saw in vision a great image repre- 
senting, as declared by inspiration, a line of great and 
powerful kingdoms located on the earth. These king- 
doms ended with a division into ten parts, ten smaller 
kingdoms, or powers. " And in the days of these kings 
shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall 
never be destroyed : and the kingdom shall not be left 
to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume 
all these kingdoms, and it shall stand forever." — Dan, 
ii. 44. As these prophetic kingdoms were all located 
on the earth, so must the universal and everlasting one 
which the God of heaven will set up be located on the 
earth also. " And the kingdom and dominion and great- 
ness of the kingdom under the whole heaven, shall be 



68 



MA^n" XOT IM3I0RTAL. 



given to the people of the saints of the Most High, whose 
kingdom is an everlasting kingdom/^ — vii. 27. 

This everlasting kingdom is the kingdom of Christ, 
the stone which, as seen in the vision interpreted by 
Daniel, was cut out of the mountain without hands, 
and that "brake in pieces " all the others, and "be- 
came a great mountain, and filled the luliole eartli.^^ 
When this kingdom has been established, and Christ 
has subdued the nations, then will be heard the great 
voices, saying," The kingdoms of this luorld have be- 
come the kingdoms of our Lord, and of his Christ; and he 
shall reign forever and ever/^ — Eev. xi. 15. At this time, 
too, will be accomplished that which God spake by the 
mouth of His prophet, Isaiah : " For, behold, I create new 
heavens, and a new earth : and the former shall not be 
remembered," (because of the perfection and glory of 
the latter) " nor come into mind. But be ye glad and 
rejoice forever in that which I create." — Isa. Ixv. 17, 18. 
Of the promised land it is said : " And the desolate land 
shall be tilled, whereas it lay desolate in the s"ght of 
all that passed by. And they shall say. This land that 
was desolate is become like the garden of EdeiiP — Ezek. 
xxxvi. 34, 35. 

The whole earth is promised to Christ for a kingdom, 
and to the saints for an inheritance. "Yet have I set 
my king upon my holy hill of Zion. I will declare my 
decree. The Lord hath said unto me, Thou art my Son ; 
this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me ; and I shall 
give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, and the ut- 
termost parts of the earth for thy possession." — Psa. ii 
6-8." Unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given, 
and the government shall be upon his shoulder; and 



REVIEW OF "REY. D. GEORGE." C9 

his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, The 
Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of 
Peace. Of the increase of his government and peace 
there shall be no end, upon the throne of Dayid, and 
upon his kingdom to order it, and to establish it with 
judgment and with justice, from henceforth eyen forever. 
The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this.'^— Isa. 
ix. 6, 7. "The Lord God shall give unto him the throne 
of his father David : and he shall reign over the house 
of Jacob forever ; and of his kingdom there shall be no 
end."— Luke i. 32, 33. 

Will there be paradisaic perfection and delights at 
that time ? Will the righteous triumph and rejoice ? 
In his days shall the righteous flourish, and abundance 
of peace so long as the moon endureth." Psa. Ixxii. 7. 
The Spirit portrays in exalted strain the peace and glory 
that will be enjoyed upon the renewed earth (paradise 
restored) by all the redeemed ones. Eighteousness shall 
be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of 
his reins. The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and 
the leopard shall lie down with the kid ; and the calf, 
and the young lion, and the fatling together, . . . The 
cow and the bear shall feed ; their young ones shall lie 
down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the 
ox. . . They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy 
mountain ; for the earth shall be full of the knowledge 
of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.'' — Isa. xi. 6-9. 
All this is but a sample of the very much that is said re- 
specting the state of things on the earth when that 
(paradise) which was lost in Adam shall be restored in 
Christ. 

Let us now see v/hether the future restoration of par- 



70 



IIAI^ XOT IMMOllTAL. 



adise has been surely set forth by the Sjjirit. Many years 
had elapsed since the death, resurrection and ascension 
of Christ : the gospel had been preached to yarious na- 
tions, and the Christian religion was rapidly increasing 
when John, an exile on Patmos, received a revelation 
from him that liveth and was dead/^ The revelation 
was of things which must shortly come to pass ; " and 
it opened to view the events of various periods reach- 
ing to the personal return of Christ, and the setting 
up of the heavenly kingdom of which we have spoken. 
" He that hath an ear/^ saith the messenger, " let him 
hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches : to him 
that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, 
which stands in the midst of the paradise of God/^ 
"When paradise existed in the beginning, the tree of life 
stood in the midst of it; and in the passage just quoted^ 
a promise is made to them that overcome, and it that is 
they shall eat of the " tree of life which is in the midst 
of the paradise." 

The book of Eevelation is prophetic. The things 
that were revealed to John were then in the future; 
they were things which should "come to pass." When 
John heard the above words of promise he had not yet 
come to the paradisaic part of the vision, but was simply 
told of a blessing that awaits the faithful. He saw 
kingdoms strong and mighty set up and cast down. He 
beheld woes, and plagues, and j udgments terrible inflicted 
upon nations and peoples, and saw great anti-christian 
powers annihilated. He saw the faithful subjected to 
persecutions bloody and diabolical, and he finally beheld 
" a new heaven and new earth," and the " new Jerusa- 
lem coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as 



KEVIEW OF "REV. D. GEOEGE." 71 

a bride adorned for her husband. ... In the midst of 
the street of it . . . was there the tree of life . . . and 
there shall be no more curse." We hare, then, the un- 
failing word of God for it, that paradise shall be restor- 
ed, but not until the Lord shall gather out all things 
that offend, and them which do iniquity/^ We have 
now seen that paradise ceased to exist at the close of 
Adam's Edenic experience, and that it has not yet been 
re-established, but will be when " the kingdoms of this 
world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his 
Christ.'^ 

We do not oyerlook the only other instance in the 
whole Bible of the use of the term paradise. That in- 
stance is 2 Cor. xii. 4 : How that he was caught up 
into paradise, and heard unspeakable words which it is 
not lawful for a man to utter." As evidence that some 
orthodox theologians, at least, do not regard Paul as 
claiming that any part of him had actually been admit- 
ted into heaven, we quote from Dr. Adam Clarke. He 
says: 

/S'c7^o^^^,(767^ has shown, that ascending to lieaven, or 
being cauglit up to lieaven, a form of speech among 
Jewish writers, to express the highest degree of inspi- 
ration. ... If we may understand St. Paul thus, it will 
remove much of the difficulty from this place, and per- 
haps the unspeakable words, verse 4, are thus to be un- 
derstood. He had the most sublime communications 
from God ; such as would be improper to mention.'^ 

The Greek preposition rendered up,^^ in this text, 
is eiSj and properly signifies at. . . . It sometimes means 
leing at, either as close ieside, or actually wifliin . . • 
But it likewise denotes motion or tendency toivard an 



73 



MAK" KOT IMMOETAL. 



object^ SO as to arrive at it; and then may be rendered 
to or into when applied to place : Biljle vs. Tradition. 
'That this was a vision^, Paul himself declares in ver. 1 : 
^' I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord/' 
He saw tvio things in connection, viz.^ paradise and "Hhe 
third heaven/^ And this paradise is just what John 
saw, on Patmos. He was, like Paul, caught toward it, so 
as to behold it, and see something of its glory. 

We have seen what paradise is ; now let us consult 
Peter regarding the " third heaven/^ He says, "by the 
word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth 
standing out of the water and in the water : whereby the 
world that then was'^ (before the flood) being over 
flowed with water, perished : but the heavens and the 
earth which are now, by the same word, kept in store, 
reserved unto fire. . . . The day of the Lord will come 
as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall 
pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall 
melt with fervent heat ; the earth also, and the works 
that are therein, shall be burned up (this language 
has, we believe, reference to the destruction of the 
present condition of things, otherwhere expressed as the 
gathering out of all things that offend, and them which 
do iniquity.'^) Nevertheless we, according to his prom- 
ise, look for new heavens and a new earth.''^ 

Dr. Clarke and others understand, and we think 
rightly so, " heavens^' in the foregoing, as also in other 
passages, to relate to the atmosphere, etc., which- sur- 
rounds the earth. "What has Peter told us ? Why, that 
the first heaven and the first earth were destroyed by 
water, "the flood;" that the second heaven and the 
second earth, now existing, shall be destroyed also, and 



REVIEW OF "EEY. IST. D. GEORGE." 73 

God has promised, after that, " new heavens and a new 
earth." 

Paradise and the " third heaven, then, are coexistent. 
"We have seen that the preposition eis, rendered up, in 
the passage, denotes motion or tendency toward an object 
so as to arrive at it, and may be rendered to ox into when 
applied to place. Paul, in his vision, seemed to be trans- 
ported beyond intervening time and events, to paradise 
and the third heaven, and saw them and the glory of 
them just as if they already existed. 

Having seen that there has been no paradise, as a 
habitation for man, in existence since that created in the 
beginning ceased to be, let us consider the promise of 
Christ to the thief. It is not, of course, pretended that 
the text furnishes direct evidence of the immortality of 
the soul, or even of the existence of an immaterial 
soul entity, but supports it by implication. Our Sa- 
viour, it is said, promised that the thief should be with 
him in paradise that day, and as both of them died and 
were Inried, it follows that they had soul entities which 
went to some paradise — a theological one, for instance. 
As the promise was made to a personality, one would 
naturally suppose some other inference would be drawn 
from the language, for if only some immateriality met 
somewhere, the event could not be reasonably consider- 
ed a fulfilment of the promise, for that was made to a 
person, and it was that that person should be with 
the person of Jesus. Any claim, therefore, that the 
promise involves the, idea of consciousness between death 
and the resurrection, is based upon the assumption that 
man possesses an entity capable of conscious existence 



74 MAK KOT IMMORTAL. 

separately from the body. Thus the thing has first to be 
assumed in order to make texts seem to teach it. 

It is said, Christ died, it is true, but his soul lived 
on ; it went into hades, a place of conscious existence. 
Is it so ? Listen to the testimony of the Spirit of the 
Living God : Therefore my heart is glad, and my 
glory rejoice th : my flesh also shall rest in hope. For 
thou wilt not leave my soul in hell (sheol), neither wilt 
thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption.^^ — Psa. 
xvi. 9, 10. David spake these words by the Spirit of 
God ; and lest some should fall into the error of sup- 
posing he spoke of himself, we turn to Peter, who says 
that David " is both dead and buried, and his sepulchre 
is with us unto this day. Therefore being a prophet, 
and . . . seeing this before, spake of the resurrection 
of Christ, that his soul was not left in hell, neither did 
his flesh see corruption." 

That in which the Spirit declared God would not 
leave the Christ soul, is sheoL Sheol is not a place, but 
a state , it is the grave in general sense, i, e.y the state 
of death. 

" The learned Tremellius, who was a Jew by birth, 
and professor of Hebrew at Sedan, where he died in 
1580, translated the Syriac version of the Bible, the old- 
est version extant, into Latin. He uniformly rendered 
the Syriac synonym for sheol into Latin, by sepulchr-uMy 
iy 0, to, (the different endings showing only the different 
grammatical constructions) which means the sepulchre, 
grave, or tomb, excepting in one single instance, Psa. 
xlix. 4, last clause, where he has rendered it, infernuSj 
hell, because he thought that the wicked could not be 
consigned to the same place as that from which the soul 



REVIEW OF "EEY. Is". D. GEOEGE." 75 

of the Psalmist was redeemed. Yet he acknowledges 
that sheol, in most places, meant the general receptacle 
of the dead. 

"In the French version, the word slieol is usually 
translated sepulchre, and only once enfer, liell, in Job 
xi. 8, where it has no relation to the dead, but is con- 
trasted with the height of heayen.^^ — BiUe vs. Tradi- 
tion. 

Sheol is not a place of conscious existence. " For in 
death there is no rememlrance of thee : in the grave " 
(sJieol) " who shall give thee thanlcs — Psa. vi. 5, " Let 
the wicked be ashamed, and let them be silent in the 
grave {sJieoT). — Psa. xxxi. 17. " Lihe sheep they are laid 
in the grave (sheol). "But God will redeem my soul 
from the power of the grave" {sheol). Are sheep con- 
scious in the state of death ? LiJce sheep the wicked are 
laid in sheol^ consequently they must be unconscious. 
It will not do to say that the bodies of the wicked are 
laid like sheep in the "grave,^' for the Psalmist says the 
wicked themselves are thus laid; and, according to the 
popular theory, the undying soul is the 7nan, the sinner. 
In order to help the popular theory concerning man^s 
nature David should have said, " like sheep the remains 
of the wicked are laid in the grave." Of course, he would 
have been at variance with himself, and would have 
stated that which was not true, for the wealthy sinners 
of whom David speaks, whose "inward thought" was 
"that their houses shall continue forever, and their 
dwelling-places to all generations ; " who called " their 
lands after their own names," had stately funerals, and 
were, in that respect, laid in the grave more like kings 
and princes than " like sheep." 



7G 



MAIS" ^^OT i:^I^IORTAL. 



" For the grave " {slieoT) " cannot praise thee ; death 
cannot celeiraie thee/^ — Isa. xxxviii. 18. Sheol, says 
Mr. George^ is the same as hades, and there the right- 
eous do praise'^ and "celebrate^' God. ^^For there is 
no work, nor device, nor hnoivledge, nor wisdom, in the 
grave" {slieol) 'loliitJier tJiou goestJ^ — EccL ix. 10. Our 
friends on the other side of the question contend that 
there is wisdom, knowledge, and device in hades, the 
Greek term which represents the Heb. slieol. " If mis- 
chief befall him by the way in which ye go, then shall 
ye bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to the grave 
(sJieol). — Gen. xlii. 38. Would the loss of a son cause 
good old Jacob to go sorrowing into this happy interme- 
diate state, this "heav^en?" All must see that sheoly 
into which the soul of Christ — Christ himself, went at 
death, is a state of unconsciousness. 

The author of the work we review, having brought 
evidence to prove that some Jews believed hades to be 
an abode of departed spirits, remarks : " Peter, speaking 
of David's prophecy, says, ' He seeing this before spake 
of the resurrection of Christ, that his soul was not left 
in hell,' {Hades, the place of departed spirits.)" We pre- 
sume it will not be farther contended that slieolh a place 
of conscious existence, since we have abundantly shown 
otherwise ; and hence the reader will perceive that the 
position of this writer renders necessary the use of hades 
in the foregoing quotation from Peter. The fact is Pe- 
ter was talking to Jews particularly : " Ye men of Israel, 
hear these words : " consequently he would be likely to 
speak to them in their own tongue, or, quoting from 
Psalms, would at least be likely to use just the words 
which David used. He would not, therefore, use the 



EETIEW OF •'REY. is". D. GEORGE." 77 

term Iiades, hilt sJieoI, the recorder of Acts having after- 
ward used the term hades as the proper representative 
of sJieoI. Peter said to the men of Israel/^ "Because 
thou wilt not leave my soui^ (the term rendered soul 
expressing the whole Beiog of Christ) -^in sJieol, neither 
wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption/ 
There is " no work^ nor device^ nor knowledge, nor wis- 
dom in sJieoU^ So says the word of God. 

Is it still affirmed that hades is a state of happy con- 
sciousness ? that it is, as contended by our author, the 
abode of departed spirits, and may be called heaven ? 
Paul declares that the righteous will, at the resurrection, 
come out of their graves, and shout the triumphant song, 
" 0 death, where is thy sting ? 0 graye " {hades) " where* 
is thy yictory ? Is there any one so simple as to be- 
lieve that Paul intended by this language to represent 
happy existences coming out of heaven and shouting 
oyer their deliverance, saying, 0 heaven, where is thy 
yictory?" And yet the theory of Mr. George would 
have us believe it. It is settled beyond reasonable con- 
troversy that Christ was in sheol between his death and 
resurrection, and could not, therefore, have been with 
the thief in any place of conscious existence. 

Mr. G., speaking of the words, "his soul was not 
left in hell, neither did his flesh see corruption," says : 
"Mark the distinction between soul and flesh.'^ We 
venture tlio opinion that few if any, not blinded by pre- 
judice, can read this text in the original and fail to see 
that the terms soul and flesh are synonyms, and re- 
present the whole person of Christ. David said, " Be- 
cause thou wilt not leave my soul in sheol, neither wilt 
thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption." Is it 



78 



MAiT JS^OT IMMOETAL. 



for one moment supposed by any advocate of the popu- 
lar theory that soul and Holy One mean two different 
parts of Christ ? They are too wise to admit that the 
body, a mere senseless tenement, according to their the- 
ory, was the Holy One, and thus open the door to a pos- 
sible inference that the soul (their idea of soul) was not 
holy. Why did not our friend tell his readers to " mark 
the distinction between soul and " Holy One ? The rea- 
son suggests itself. 

Eemember, Peter spoke to Hebrews, and, it is reason- 
able to suppose, used Hebrew terms. If this be so, the 
term which he used in saying, " his soul was not left," 
etc., was nepliesli^ a word of which Parkhurst declares 
he could find no passage where it undoubtedly means the 
spiritual part of man, or what is commonly denomi- 
nated soul. 

Murdock's Syriac translation reads : " And he fore- 
saw, and spoke of the resurrection of Messiah, that he 
was not left in the grave, neither did his body see cor- 
ruption. This Jesus hath God resuscitated ; and we are 
all his witnesses.^^ — Acts ii. 31, 32. Take notice, the 
Syriac has lie instead of the E. V. words Ms soul ; and 
it has grave, instead of hell. This is correct, for Christ 
himself went into the grave ; Christ himself died, and 
was " resuscitated." Although the proper meaning of 
hell rightly enough expresses that of grave, its theologi- 
cal meaning is a gross perversion. Hades, rendered hell 
in the text, means grave, as the Syriac has it, and, we 
venture to affirm, is not once used in the Bible to de- 
note a place of separate conscious existence of any part 
of man. 

There is absolutely nothing connected with the text, 



REVIEW OF "KEY. K. D. GEORGE." 



79 



Luke xxiii. 43, that gives any countenance to the idea of 
the existence of a conscious entity between death and 
the resurrection, except the punctuation, and that only 
as the reader assumes the very thing the text is wanted 
to prove. The comma being placed after thee, the sense 
of the text is that the promise of Jesus would be fulfilled 
the day it was made, hence it is concluded that as 
Christ and the thief both died (though the theory we 
oppose denies that either Jesus or the thief died ; only 
their tenements, their remains,^') there must have been 
some part of each which existed in consciousness, and 
were together in paradise. 

If the comma be placed after to-day, the sense will 
be that the promise was given that day, and would be 
fulfilled at some time then future. Thus it is obvious 
that upon the punctuation depends all the argument that 
advocates of the doctrine of man's immortality seek to 
draw from the text. We must not overlook the fact that 
while the words are the words of Jesus, the punctuating 
is done by the translators, the original being without it. 
There was no approach to a regular system of punctua- 
tion until the sixteenth century. 

Those who contend that the text, just as it stands, 
correctly represents the promise of Jesus to the thief, 
and that it implies consciousness in death, are compelled, 
as we have said, to assume, first, that there is a part of 
man which does not die ; and second, that there is some- 
where a place called paradise, to which this undying part 
repairs at the death of the other part. The former, we 
assert, is w^holly unjustifiable in view of the fact that 
the word of God always represents man as mortal, and 



80 



UXl^ KOT IM3I0ETAL. 



the race as perishing, naturally, and the latter we ha^e 
shown to be untrue. 

Paradise, says Mr. George, ^' may be called heayen.'^ 
Then God must be there. But Jesus, after his resurrec- 
tion, said to Mary, ^- 1 am not yet ascended to my Father.'^ 
It is replied to this : " what we assert is, that the Saviour 
and the thief had each a distinct entity, called the soul 
. . . that these souls, after their departure from the 
body, were together in paradise.'^ The assertor of this 
must surely overlook the fact that the me with whom 
the thief was promised to be, is the same ine whom 
Mary was told not to touch for he had " not yet ascend- 
ed," etc. If an immaterial entity was the me, how could 
Mary touch it? The idea is somewhat absurd. As 
the soul is asserted to be the man, the real personality, 
it must, of course, have been the "I" which had "not 
yet ascended " to the Father ; and yet it is aflBrmed 
that Christ^s sonl did go to heaven the day of the cruci- 
fixion. We hope to be preserved from ever being thus 
brought into conflict with the testimony of Christ. 
What a cruel theory to be ever leading its patrons into 
such dangerous errors. In no sense was there fulfilled 
such a promise as it is alleged Christ gave the thief. 

But there was a promise, and it will surely be fulfill- 
ed. What was it? Jesus had for years been teaching 
that at a future time he would come and reign as king. 
For example: "When the Son of man shall come in 
his glory, and all his holy angels with him, then shall 
he sit upon the throne of his glory." — Matt. xxv. 31. Of 
this fact the thief was probably not ignorant, and doubt- 
less being impressed that Jesus was no deceiver, he cried 
unto him, "Lord, remember me when thou comest in thy 



EEYIEW OF "REV. D. GEORGE." 81 

hingdomP What an idea they must have of Christ's 
kingdom who assume that it is located in hades ! Yv^e 
haye seen that the establishment of Christ's kingdom 
will be the re-establishment of paradise; so the Saviour's 
promise, "thou shalt be with, me in paradise/^ is in per- 
fect harmony with the prayer, 

Lange's Commentary says, the thief "represents to 
himself the moment when the Messiah comes in his 
kingly glory to erect his kingdom upon earth, and desires 
that he then, awakened from the graye, may enter in 
with Him into the glory of his Lord/^ Consonant to 
this is the following from Archbishop Whately. He 
says : " Obserye that ' into thy kingdom/ is a mistrans- 
lation; it should be, ^in thy kingdom/ The meaning 
isj at thy second coming in triumphant glory/^ 

Whately further says, the malefactor looked "for a 
kingdom of God which the death of Jesus was not to 
destroy, but to complete ; he understood that in some 
way or other, the Christ must suffer these things, and 
enter into his glory Other learned and eminent com- 
mentators admit that the thief expected his prayer 
would be answered at some future time. We are com- 
pelled to the conclusion that, strange as it may seem, 
the malefactor was the first to perceiye any thing of 
the deep meaning of the superscription oyer the cross^ 
and was the first to herald the Lord's royal dignity; and 
that, too, at the yery moment y^hen the Messianic hope 
of the apostles themselyes, though they were directly in- 
structed by Christ, was most terribly shaken. 

We haye seen that Lange, Whately and others, includ- 
ing, we belieye, Scott and Barnes, either hold or admit 
that the thief expected his prayer would be answered 



83 



MAK" KOT IMMORTAL. 



when Christ should set up his kingdom^ or at some time 
subsequent to the day of crucifixion. This position 
could only be adopted by these men upon one of two 
principles. Either they must in their own minds place 
the comma after ^Ho-day/^ the idea thus being that 
Jesus that day promised the thief should be with him at 
some future time; or else they must accept the term 

to-day " in the strict sense of this day, a proper thing 
to do, as it may justly be so translated ; the meaning thus 
being either just the same as in the other case or that 
this referred to the day of the establishment of Christ's 
kingdom. When people find fault with us for taking 
some account of the punctuation and showing a mani- 
fest error in it, they forget that the service which they 
compel the text to yield to their theory is based wholly 
on the punctuation. 

We belieye the term paradise, in the text, refers to 
the heavenly paradise which is to be established on the 
earth at the coming of Christ; and that Jesus gave the 
thief the promise of being with him at that time. 
While the text admits of several reasonable interpreta- 
tions, and all in perfect harmony with the view of the 
unity of man's nature, it cannot be used in support of 
inherent immortality without first assumhig the very 
thing to be proved, thus doing gross violence to some of 
the most palpable principles of Scripture exposition. 

When paradise shall be re-established; when the 
hills shall laugh in their beauty, and the valleys sing 
the Eedeemer's praise ; when the " wilderness shall be 
glad," and the '^desert shall rejoice and blossom as the 
rose ; " when the whole earth shall be robed in garments 
of unfading loveliness, and become one broad highway 



REVIEW OF ^^KEY. D. GEORGE." 83 

of holiness, one great paradise with no spot on all its 
wide extent to send up the wail of sorrow; when the 
^Uhrone of God and the Lamb shall be in it/^ and the 
redeemed shall "see his face; and his name shall be in 
their foreheads ; " when " the ransomed of the Lord " 
shall " come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy/* 
then will all Divine promises be fulfilled : then will faith 
and hope be swallowed up in the full fruition of para- 
disaic glory. 

" The earth shall all be paradise."— M72^. 

Our Lord and Master said, " Blessed are the meek 
for they shall inherit the earth ; " and God, by the mouth 
of His prophet, had long before promised, " the meek 
shall inherit the earth, and delight themselves in the 
abundance of peace." The meek do not now delight 
themselves in abundance of peace, nor will they until 
Zion's King shall destroy them that corrupt the earthy 
and shall establish a peace based on universal Chris- 
tian brotherhood, and perfect knowledge of and obedi- 
ence to the Divine will. It is here that the " Son of man 
shall sit upon the throne of his glory ; and where our 
blessed Lord and Saviour reigns as king, and rules in 
righteousness, there will the saints find it ineffable de- 
light to be. May all our readers so live that they shall 
be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the resur- 
rection from the dead, for thus shall an entrance be se- 
cured into immortality and glory. Let us by both 
precept and example do all we can in inducing others 
to join us in earnestly and faithfully striving to possesa 
at last that unspeakably blessed prize, life in the eternal 
Icingdom soon to le set up. 



84 



CHAPTEE V. 
Paet L 

" For we know that if our eartlily liouse of this tabernacle 
were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with 
hands, eternal in the heavens," etc. — 2 Cor. v. 1-9. 

OuK author, in his opening remarks on this text, af- 
firms that they who deny the existence of an immate- 
rial sonl-entity find " this passage, like many others/^ 
^^difiicult to dispose of." Of a certain writer's explica- 
tion of the text he remarks, that his effort is not to 
bring out the obyious meaning of the text, but to destroy' 
it, and make a noise to bewilder the reader." He finally 
more than intimates that said writer uses certain argu- 
ments because they " are absolutely necessary to make 
a smoke under which to murder the text." 

A certain noted author was, while on his death-bed, 
afforded blessed peace and comfort by the thought that 
he could not remember to have written anything which, 
standing upon the threshold of the tomb, he would re- 
call, were it in his power to do so. The above noted and 
many other similar remarks of Mr. George must be 
thought by every cultivated mind, whether religious or 
not, to be very unworthy a professed lover of Jesus. It 
is not easy to see how he could so far forget the high and 
holy principles he professes, and doubtless does labor 
to maintain, as to be found thus impugning the motives 
of other servants of Christ. To every Christian reader 
it presents proof of the great need of prayerful care lest 
we bring reproach upon the cause of righteousness. 
Casting over the remarks the mantle of charity, and 



REVIEW OF "liEY. i^. D. GEORGE/^ 85 

assuming tliat they were made under the influence of 
some undue momentary excitement which prevented a 
recognition of their full import, we will cherish the hope 
that whether lying at the door of death, or whether 
standing before the judgment seat of Christ, where, as 
said Paul, believers must all appear, his thoughts siay 
not be haunted by recollections of them, nor any future 
hours made sad by vain wishes that they had never been 
uttered. 

The text, not unlike others, is a difficult one to 
dispose of,'^ and we humbly suggest to all, whatever 
may be their faith, the eminent propriety and wis- 
dom of not attempting it. The experiment would of 
necessity prove extremely hazardous. No, good Chris- 
tian friend George, don't undertake to dispose of it your- 
self; and if you find any one else trying to do so, dis- 
suade them, if possible, from the undertaking. Prayer- 
fully and carefully seek to understand it, and then it 
will not be thought necessary to dispose of it. He asks : 

"If man is not a compound being, what is the iv^ 
dwelling and groaning in the ' tabernacle ; ' the ive ' at 
home in the body ; ' the ive which can be ^ absent from 
the body, and be present with the Lord ; ^ the ive who 
M^now that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were 
dissolved,' have a heavenly building ? '' 

In reply to the above we remark, that, beyond all 
reasonable question, the of whom Paul spoke were 
himself and the Corinthian brethren to whom ho wrote. 
Our seeming excited author says: "The honest mind 
perceives at once that the sentiment is, that men may be 
absent from the body in a conscious state." Only the 
dislionest mind, then, "perceives" otherwise. How sad. 
how very sad is it to find a Christian, writer manifesting 



86 



MA^^ NOT IMMORTAL. 



such, a spirit in :)pposing what lie ielieves, of coarse, to 
be error. We should think he would esteem it wise, 
nay indispensable to evince that sweet sjDirit of Chris- 
tian kindness and tenderness which dwells richly in 
hearts that love the Master and are consecrated to his 
seryice, and which followers of Jesus should always man- 
ifest in defending what they believe to be truth, leaving 
results with God. Doing otherwise reveals a want of 
faith in infinite power and wisdom, and brings reproach 
upon that in the supposed interests of which it is in- 
dulged. 

That the texts teach a conscious existence of some 
part of man (the real man, as is claimed) between death 
and the resurrection is a bold assumption, for if it be 
not true that man is capable of such existence, then an 
explication which precludes that idea must be adopted. 
Then again, the language could not be held to neces- 
sarily teach an intermediate conscious existence, even 
were it admitted that man is immortal, for Paul evident- 
ly had no reference to an intermediate state of any kind. 

It is maintained by most of those who affirm im- 
mortality of man, that the soul — a living, thinking im- 
materiality — exists in a conscious state between death 
and the resurrection. How, upon such a theory, and 
that the tabernacle," the "earthly house" is the hu- 
man body, can the expression, "we have a building of 
God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the 
heavens," be harmonized with their belief in the res- 
urrection of the body? If Paul asserts by implication 
that a soul-entity goes to heaven, or some other place 
of happiness, at death, he also asserts that that soul- 
entity is, when it leaves the body, clothed upon with 



KEVIEW OE "EEY. ZsT. D. GEORGE.'^ 87 

"an house not made with hands/^ a "building of God/' 
which is eternal. Thus the soul has an eternal body 
given it at death, and at the resurrection the two entities 
must be put into the resurrected body, and so man will 
thenceforth be composed of a soul and two bodies. De- 
fenders of the popular theory cannot escape this con- 
clusion, extremely absurd though it is. If, in attempting 
to escape it, they urge that the heavenly " building,^' or 
" house is the state of heavenly blessedness, etc., then 
the question arises, why not apply the same rule of ex- 
position to the expression "earthly house Consist- 
ency would demand that it be done notwithstanding the 
fact that doing it would render the text utterly useless 
to their theory. 

Dr. Lange remarks : 

" The present tense would seem to refer to some period 
immediately after death. But if the soul is to have a 
body corresponding to its condition at that time (of 
which, to say the least, the Scriptures distinctly say 
nothing) then the dwelling here mentioned cannot be 
eternal. Nor would what is said in ver. 2 of our house 
which is from heaven, agree very well with such an as- 
sertion." 

The apostle is not, as is generally understood, speak- 
ing of the human body, but of the state of man in the 
present condition of things ; and he contrasts it with 
the state which will exist after the resurrection, the final 
consummation. The present state of man is compared 
to a temporary residence in a transitory tabernacle, fixed 
upon the ground for a short time, then taken to pieces. 
Man's state in a future, or resurrection life is compared 
to a residence in a magnificent building, such as no 
human power can make, and which will endure eternal- 



88 



MAIN" XOT IMMOETAL. 



ly, not being liable to ruin, nor to be taken to pieces; a 
building of wliicli God is the maker, and wliicli He will, 
in his appointed time, send down from heaven. Agree- 
ably to this a learned divine who wrote about fifty years 
ago, says : 

And here it is proper to obserye, that the apostle 
does not aflSrm that the virtuous in a future state will 
dwell in heaven, but only that the house, which is hereaf- 
ter intended for them, is oioiu in heaven, and will at the 
proper time descend into this world, which he more ex- 
plicitly asserts in the next verse. The meaning, there- 
fore, of the apostle's declaration, stripped of its metaphor- 
ical dress, is this : We know that when the present 
frail and mortal state is passed, it will be succeeded by 
a state of everlasting glory and felicity, which God has 
prepared for all his faithful servants." 

For we that are in this tabernacle do groan, being 
br^rdened; not for that we would be unclothed, but 
clothed upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of 
life." — Ver. 4. Of this verse, the same writer says: 

"In this state of frailty and suffering, we who are 
heirs of the promised inheritance often groan under the 
pressure of fatigue, affliction, and persecution, and 
earnestly desire to be released from the burden. ISTot in- 
deed that we desire death for its own sake, and much 
less do we covet that state of insensibility to which 
death, for a time reduces us: the object of our desire is, 
to enter upon a new and happy state of existence, and 
if possible, to escape the pains of dying, and the dis- 
grace of the tomb, so that this frail, mortal condition 
might be immediately absorbed and lost in a state of 
Immortality and blessedness." 

Says Archbishop Whately 

" This passage would, I say, of itself, seem to relate 



REVIEW OF "RET. I^. D. GEORGE.'^ 



89 



to the condition of the soul separate from the body ; and 
indeed some commentators have referred to it as regard- 
ing the separate state. Bat they should have remem- 
bered that the apostle is most evidently alluding to the 
state, whatever it is, in which we are to appear hefore 
Christ's judgment seat ; ^0 thdii if y^e are then to have 
bodies, he cannot be supposed, without a very forced 
and harsh interpretation, to be speaking of a separate 
state, in the words immediately preceding. 

" And if you look a little further back, Paul himself 
furnishes a ready interpretation of his own expression 
here : ' We know,^ say she, ' that if oilr earthly house of 
this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of 
God — a house not made with hands — eternal in the heav- 
ens.' . . . Having spoken of the burden of that corrupt- 
ible body which we now inhabit, he adds this caution, 
on purpose, as it seems, to guard against the supposi- 
tion that the deliverance he looks for from this burden, 
is a separate state of the soul : What we desire, he says, 
is, ' not to be unclothed ' (namely, as in a separate state),; 
but the hope we cherish is, he says, 'io be clothed upon,' 
that is, to have an addition made to what we now pos- 
sess, by being placed in a far superior habitation/' 

We quote also from Milton, who says : 

"It is sufficiently apparent, however, that the object 
of this passage is not to inculcate the separation of the 
soul from the body, but to contrast the animal and ter- 
restrial life of the whole man with the spiritual and 
heavenly. Hence in the first verse ' the house of this 
tabernacle ' is opposed, not to the soul, but to ' a build- 
ing of God, a house not made with hands/ that is, to the 
final renewal of the whole man, as Beza also explains it, 
whereby ' we are clothed upon.' (The E. V. adds, ven 
2, ^with a house which is from heaven') 'being clothed 
c . . not naked,' ver. 3. This distinctly appears from 
yer. 4: ^not for that we would be unclothed, but clothed 



90 



MAK 2^0T IMMOKTAL. 



upon, that mortality might be swallowed up of life/ See 
also yer. 5^, ^now he that hath wrought us for the self- 
same thing ; ' not for the separation of the soul from 
the body, but for the perfecting of both. Wherefore 
the clause in the eighth verse, ^to be absent from the 
body, and to be present with the Lord/ must be under- 
stood of the consummation of our happiness; and Hhe 
body' must be taken for this frail life, as is common in 
the sacred writers ; or perhaps to be ^at home in the 
body, and to be absent from the Lord,' ver. 6, may mean 
nothing more than to be entangled in worldly affairs, 
and to have little leisure for heavenly things; the rea- 
son of which is given in ver. 7, ' for we walk by faith, 
not by sight:' whence it follows, ver. 8, ' we are confi- 
dent and willing rather to be absent from the body, 
and to be present with the Lord ; ' that is, to renounce 
worldly things as much as possible, and to be occupied 
with heavenly. The ninth verse proves still more clearly 
that the expressions ^ to be present ' and ^ to be absent ' 
both refer to this life : ^ wherefore we labor that whether 
present or absent, we may be accepted with God:' for 
no one supposes that the souls of men are occupied from 
the time of death to that of the resurrection in endeavors 
to render themselves acceptable to God ; that is the em- 
ployment of the present life, and its reward is not to be 
looked for till the second coming of Christ.' ^ The same 
sense is to be ascribed to 2 Pet. i. 13, 14, 15 ; ^as long as 
I am in the tabernacle,' etc., that is in this life." 

On ver. 1, Lange further remarks : "It is hardly prob- 
able that such a man would have changed his mind so 
soon after writing the fifteenth chapter of his former 
Epistle to the Corinthians, and so should now have be- 
lieved that he was to pass immediately at death into the 
blessedness of the resurrection body." Concerning the 
words absent from tlie locly, and present with the Lord, 
Eev. Thomas Belsham remarks : 



REVIEW OF "KEY. is^ D. GEOKGE.'^ 91 

" That is, to quit the present state, and to enter upon 
that state of recompense and happiness which we are 
to enjoy with Christ. Tliis text is usually understood 
as expressing the apostle's persuasion, that death is a 
separation of the soul from the body, and his expecta- 
tion that the separate spirit would be introduced into a 
state of glory and happiness in the presence of Christ, 
while the body is perishing in the grave. But it is 
quite impossible that this should be the apostle's mean- 
ing, as he had expressly declared in his former epistle, 
1 Cor. XV. 18, that if there be no resurrection of the 
dead, all who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished ; 
which is palpably inconsistent with their possessing 
life and happiness in a separate state ; and the apostle 
cannot be supposed to contradict himself. And in 
truth, the apostle's language in this passage will not 
bear the construction which is usually given to it ; and 
gives no countenance to the doctrine of an intermedi- 
ate state of perception, activity and enjoyment between 
death and the resurrection. He is here only contrast- 
ing the present state of trial and suffering with the fu- 
ture promised state of happy existence in the presence 
of Christ. He never once mentions or even glances at 
an intermediate state in which the spirit will be happy, 
when separate from the body. On the contrary, he re- 
presents the state which immediately succeeds to death, 
as a state of nakedness, ver. 3, which was so far from be- 
ing the object of his wish, that he expresses his earnest 
desire to be exempted from it by being permitted to con- 
tinue in the world till the appearance of Christ. That 
the apostle regarded the season of rest in the grave as 
an evanescent point, hardly worthy of notice when 
compared with the glory which was to succeed, cannot 
reasonably be doubted." 

The texts we have been considering will now be given 
as rendered in Lange's commentary, a work representing 
the critical ability of a large number of Bibje students, 



92 UA^ -NOT TMMOKTAL. 

and the reader will see at a glance the propriety and 
soundness of our exposition of them^ and their entire 
harmony with our view of man's nature and destiny. 

^^For we know that, if our earthly house of this 
tabernacle (tent dwelling) were dissolved, we have (in 
the heavens) a building of (from) God, a house not made 
with hands, eternal (,) in the heavens (orn. in the heav- 
ens). For in this (also) we groan, earnestly desiring to 
be clothed upon with (to put on over this) our house 
which is from heaven : if so be that (since indeed) be- 
ing clothed we shall not be found naked. For (even) 
we that are in this (the) tabernacle do groan, being 
burdened: not for that we w^ould be unclothed, (be- 
cause we are not willing to be unclothed), but clothed 
upon, that mortality (our mortal part) might be swal- 
lowed up of (by) life. Xow (But) he that hath wrought 
us (out) for the self-same thing is G-od, who also (om. 
also) hath given us the earnest of the Spirit.'^ 

Dr. Priestly says of ver. 10, "For we must all appear 
before the judgment seat of Christ,'^ "This clearly 
shows that the views of the apostle w'ere not directed to 
any thing short of the resurrection of the dead and the 
future judgment ; and that he had no prospect of any 
reward before that time. This, therefore, is the Jcey by 
vvhich we must interpret all that precedes this verse.'* 
So we think. 

"We have found Whately, Belsham, Milton, Priestly, 
and others advocating our explication, substantially ; and 
we have found Lange and others opposing that of Mr. 
George notwithstanding he confidently says, " The hon- 
est mind must perceive at once that the sentiment is, 
that men may be absent from the body in a conscious 
state." We turn sadly away from this and like expres- 



REVIEW OF "KEY. D. GEORGE." 



93 



sions, and trust we may not again meet with such a dis- 
play, especially in connection with remarks upon a text 
concerning which so great want of proper information 
is betrayed. 

We do not believe that any, having attentively read 
the foregoing remarks, will entertain grave doubts as to 
their soundness and truthfulness, but should they do so 
we will not even intimate that they are other than al- 
together " honest." When theologians of the popular 
faith write concerning the theory of consciousness in 
death, they use language vastly different from any thing 
th3.t can be found in Paul's writings. But then, of 
course, Paul did not learn that kind of theology. We 
confess to a decided preference for the Pauline sort. 

Part II. 

"And they stoned Stephen, calling upon God, and saying. 
Lord Jesus, receive my spirit ! and he kneeled down, and cried 
"with a loud voice, Lord, lay not this sin to their charge. And 
when he had said this, he fell asleep." — Acts vii. 59, 60. "And de- 
vout men carried Stephen to his burial, and made great lamen- 
tation over him." — Chap. viii. 2. 

CoIs^CER:^^iTG this text little need be said. They 
who so zealously defend the punctuation of Christ's 
promise to the thief, being well aware that its seeming 
service of their theory results wholly from the punctu- 
ation of the text, lose their ardor for that kind of de- 
fence when they reach here. None will deny that the text 
as it stands attributes the act of calling upon God to the 
murderous Jews. We might, therefore, press against 
the popular theory so much of the sentiment of the text 
as is due to the style of punctuation, but, recognizing 
the fallibility of the translators^ we freely admit that 



94 



MA^^- K^OT IMMOr.TAL. 



the circumstances of the case render it certain that it 
was Stephen who thus called. Dr. Alexander renders 
the text thus : And they stoned Stephen calling (upon 
God) and saying," etc. 

Our author, like many others of his faith, finds it 
very convenient sometimes to assume that "spirit" and 
soul" are one and the same. ^^For the word of God 
is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged 
Bword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul 
and spirit^^ etc. — Heb. iv. 12. If soul and spirit are one 
and the same, and an immaterial entity, how, pray tell 
us, can they be divided ? Is such an entity, notwith- 
Btanding " indivisibility " has so long been affirmed of 
it, after all capable of being torn asunder ? But the 
passage certainly indicates that soul and spirit are two 
things, and as such are capable of being separated. So, 
too, the following : 

" And the very God of peace sanctify you wholly ; 
and I pray God your whole spirit and soul and body be 
preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus 
Christ." — 1 Thess. v. 23. Do men possess two abstract 
entities capable of conscious existence separately from 
the organization and from each other ? If so, and the 
80ul is tlie man, what sort of an existence is the spirit ? 
Our author's theory makes the living being called man 
a most singular complication, unlike any thing in the 
heavens above or in the earth beneath, so far as either 
science or revelation enlighten us. 

"When Samson was at one time "sore athirst" he 
said, and now shall I die for thirst, and fall into the 
hands of the uucircumcised?" But water was given 



EEYIEW OF " KEY. D. GEORGT.." 95 

him : "and when he had drunk^ his spirit came again, 
and lie revived.'^ 

The theory of so-called orthodox theologists is that 
when what they call the spirit leaves the organization 
the body is dead. If this be so then Samson must have 
been dead when he drank the water, for it was not un- 
til he drank that his " spirit came again and he reyiyed.^' 
They will hardly insist that this passage teaches the 
existence of a spirit entity ; and yet they would vigor- 
ously urge it as proof of such existence did not the act 
of drinking precede the return of the departed spirit. 
Of course, the spirit that returned was nothing more 
than Samson's animation, vigor, 

A nearly famished Egyptian was found and brought 
to David; who furnished him with food. "And when 
he had eaten, his spirit came again to him.'' — 1 Sam. 
XXX. 12. This is another instance of a man's spirit 
leaving him, and being brought back again by taking 
nourishment. Nobody will be so simple as to suppose 
that a conscious spirit-entity is here referred to. It 
would, however, be no more unreasonable than is the 
same supposition concerning many other texts that are 
urged in support of the spirit-entity theory. 

The Greek term for sinrit, in the text. Acts vii. h% 
is pieuma. Its corresponding, or Hebrew term is ritali. 
They are generally translated spirit ; but they are also 
rendered Ireath, air, luind, mind, life, disposition, etc. 
Like the Hebrew term nepliesli, rendered soul, it is some- 
times applied to the beasts. That it ever means an en- 
tity in man capable of conscious existence when separ- 
ated from the organization, we deny, since there is ab- 
solutely no proof of it. 



9G 



MAN" KOT IMMuKTAL. 



Pneuma^ the principle of life, is sometimes, as may 
be the case in the record of Stephen's death, put for life 
itself. Pull me out of the net that they (David's en- 
emies) " have laid privily for me ; for thou art my strength. 
Into thine hand I commit my spirit : thou hast redeem- 
ed me, 0 Lord God of truth." — Psa. xxxi. 4, 5. It will 
not be claimed that David wanted to die and hence de- 
sired that God might take away an immaterial, immor- 
tal spirit, for just the reverse is plainly true of the psalm- 
ist. His enemies planned his destruction. In the emer- 
gency he did not trust in himself, for it seemed that his 
enemies must triumph for aught he could do to prevent 
them; ^^but,'' said he, ^^I trust in the Lord.'^ ^*Thou 
hast heretofore " redeemed me, 0 Lord God of truth ; 
therefore ^^into thine hand I now commit my spirit," my 
life, for safety. 

"For the which cause I also suffer these things: 
nevertheless I am not ashamed : for I know whom I 
have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep 
that which / have committed unto him against (unto) 
that day." — 2 Tim. i. 12. What was it Paul committed 
to Christ, being persuaded that his Saviour is able to 
keep it until the day of final reward? All must ad- 
mit that it was his life, that life which he possessed by 
virtue of union with Christ, the author of eternal life. 
It was not the natural life that Paul referred to : he had 
good reason to expect that would be destroyed by vio- 
lence. 

To the church at Colosse, Paul wrote: "Set your 
affections on things above^ not on things on the earth. 
For ye are dead" (condemned to death, hence reckoned 
as dead) " and your life is hid with Christ in God/'— ^ 



KEVIEW OF ^'REY. I^. D. GEORGE." 0? 

Col. iii. 2, 3. Here it is distinctly stated that it is a liCe 
which those belieyers committed to Christ, and it is "hid 
with " him " in God." That being the case, when will 
they receive that life, and thus enter upon their reward ? 
Will it be at death ? When Christ, who is our life, shall 
apj)eary then shall ye also appear with him in glory. — 
Ver. 4 It is at the second coming of Christ that saints 
enter upon their reward : it is then they receive eternal 
life in full and glorious reality. 

Mr. George contends, and in this he simply echoes 
latter-day theology, that the soul was Stephen's self and 
he contends also that departed souls are in hades, which 
he also terms paradise, between death and the resurrec- 
tion. If this be so, then, even if we admit the existence 
of a spirit-entity apart from the body, Stephen's prayer 
was not answered, and Stephen must, under such a sup- 
position, have been well aware that it would not be, 
for though Christ was in hades (Bible hades) between 
his death and resurrection he is now, and was when 
Stephen was martyred, in heaven, sitting at the right 
hand of God. If, therefore, Stephen prayed Christ to 
receive a conscious spirit-entity, surely none will insist 
that he received answer to the prayer if that entity 
went directly to hades, there to remain until the resur- 
rection morning. 

Suppose we admit, for the moment, thai a spirit-en- 
tity was Stephen's self, the person, the real man ; what 
then ? Would the admission help the theory we com- 
bat ? By no means. The text distinctly states that Ste- 
phen, the man, "fell asleep," and that "devout men 
carried" hiin, the man, Stephen, "to his burial, and 
made great lamentation over 7^m." Why deny this ac- 



98 



MAl^ NOT IMMORTAL. 



con lit, and say Stejolien did not fall asleep, and was not 
buried ? We confess to an utter inability to discover 
any wisdom in a denial of this plain testimony of inspi- 
ration. We would not deny it on any consideration, 
howeyer seemingly important. 

Part III. 

" For which cause we faint not ; but though our outward man 
perish, yet the inward rr.an is renewed day by day." — 2 Cor.iv. 16. 

A WRITER remarks concerning this language: 

"From this it is often inferred, as Paul spake of an 
outer and inner man, man must be a double entity, hay- 
ing one real man inside of another. To this we haye 
no great objection, but insist on knowing what the in- 
ner man is. It cannot be the immortal soul, for that 
cannot be renewed day by day: immortality is an un- 
changeable attribate.^^ 

To this Mr. George replies thus : 

" The writer would cast dust in our eyes by stating 
that immortality is an unchangeable attribute, and, 
therefore, the soul cannot change in any sense. But 
did eyer any one contend that immortality was the only 
attribute of the soul ? " 

If there is any casting of dust on the part of any 
one, in this matter, we think the reader will at once per- 
ceiye who the guilty party is, and will say of Mr. G., 
®*thou art the man." He claims that immortality is an 
attribute of the human soul, and at the same time he 
affirms the soul is the " inward (man)" which Paul 
gaid "is reneioecl day by day." This is an obyious con- 
tradiction. If immortality is an attribute of the hu- 
man soul, then the soul cannot be renewed^ and conse- 
quently cannot be that to which Paul referred in the 



REVIEW OE "EEY. ^^T. D. GEORGE." 99 

language under consideration. What is the meaning 
of renew ? Webster defines it, — 

" To make over as good as new ; to restore to former 
freshness or perfection ; to give new life to ; to restore ; 
to re-establish." 

Paul uses the term in the sense of making new spirit- 
ually; being transformed. - "Be ye transformed by the 
renewing of your mind." — Eom. xii. 2. Renewed, there- 
fore, as used by Paul in 3 Cor. iv. 16, necessarily im- 
plies a tendency on the part of the " inward (man)," in 
the absence of the renewing power, to decay, to wasting 
away, to disestablishment. Hence we say, if the expres- 
sion "inward (man)" has reference to an entity in 
man, then the text proves beyond controversy that im- 
mortality is not an attribute of that entity, for it must 
be a fact, of course, that immortality is not subject to 
any wasting process, and cannot, therefore, have need 
oi renewal ; neither is it subject to disestablishment, and 
so cannot require re-establishing. 

But, says Mr. George, " did ever any one contend 
that immortality was the only attribute of soul ? " He 
seems to entirely overlook the fact that the writer whom 
he quotes does not intimate that any one " did ever " so 
contend: he is not speaking so much about what at- 
tributes are claimed for the theological soul, as of the 
nature of the attribute immortality. 

Dr. Lange says : " The outward man is an expression 
found only in this place, and it denotes the whole per- 
sonal existence, so far as it is embodied in nature and 
the laws of the external common life. On the other 
hand, our inward {man), denotes the same personal 
existence, so far as it is determined by the Divine law, 



100 



MAK KOT niMORTAL. 



and participates in the fulness of the Divine life. . . • 
The doctrine of Oollenbusch and Menken, that the 
inner man is an invisible body, existing in some con- 
cealed form within ns, cannot be sustained by any 
natural exegesis, or by the plain meaning of the words/^ 

Theol'igists generally agree, substantially, with Ool- 
lenbusch and Menken, for our confident author but ex- 
presses a common sentiment when he claims that the 
theological soul-entity is the maii.^ and only resides in a 
clay tenement which, when the soul leaves it, is only the 
remains of a man. Such a doctrine, we affirm, in the 
language of Dr. Lange, " cannot be sustained by any 
natural exegesis, or by the plain meaning" of Scripture 
"words.'^ Meyer thinks outivard man denotes ^^that 
which is visible in us, i. 6., our corporeal nature, pud in- 
luard {man) our intellectual, rational and moral selves." 

We feel quite safe in saying Paul's inward man was 
his mi7id. " For I delight in the law of God after the in- 
ward man." — Eom. vii. 22. There can be no question, 
we think, that the apostle here uses iniuard man for his 
mind. That this is so he plainly enough indicates in 
verse 23 : " But I see another law in my members, 
warring against the law of my mind, and bringing 
me into captivity to the law which is in my members." 
Paul delighted in " the law of God," his mind, reason 
and judgment, approving it and causing him to take 
pleasure in its practice. But the law of the members, 
the appetites and passions, forming a kind of another 
self, was continually waging war with the better self, 
and brought the reason somewhat into captivity to the 
inferior powers. Paul's whole meaning is still further in- 
dicated in ver. 25 of chap. vii. : So then, with the mind 



REVIEW OF "REV. D. GEOEGE." 101 

I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the 
law of sin/^ What can be plainer than that Paul's "in 
ward man was the mind, and his " outward man 
the flesh, with its members. 

Dr. Adam Clarke, writing on Kom. yii. 22, quotes as 
follows from one whom he characterizes as a "pious and 
sensible writer:'^ "The inward man always signifies the 
mind ; which either may, or may not, be the subject 
of grace.^' It is so plain that iniuard man means 
the mind, we think he must be straitened indeed, who 
will go to 2 Cor. iy. 16 for proof of the doctrine of in- 
herent immortality. 



CHAPTEE VI, 
Part I. 

" According to my earnest expectation and my hope, that in 
nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all boldness, as always, 
so now also, Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether it be 
by life, or by death. For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. 
But if I live in the flesh, this is the fruit of my labor : yet what I 
shall choose I wot not. For I am in a strait betwixt two, having 
a desire to depart, and to be with Christ ; which is far better. 

Nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you." — Phil, 
i 20-24. 

Oe this language of Paul Mr. George remarks, p. 55 
of his book, as follows : 

" Every honest reader of the Bible will see at a glance 
that the contrast is between liying ' in the flesh ' (ver, 
22) ; abiding ' in the flesh ' (ver. 24), on the one hand, 
and departing ' to le with Christ,^ on the other. To es- 
tablish this needs no argument, as the passage is be- 
fore the reader. Paul is divided in his feeling, having 
two objects before him, whioii seem to stand opposed 



102 



MAiT IsOT IMMORTAL. 



to eacli other; namely, his own happiness and the 
well-being of his brethren. For his own sake, he de- 
sires to die and depart ; to be with Christ/^ 

We have long been of the opinion that the most rea- 
sonable and natural exposition of the text is that which 
makes the contrast between living in the flesh, abiding 
in the flesh, on the one hand, and dejjartinc/ to be with 
Christ, on the other : but we are entirely unwilling 
to say that eyery honest reader of the Bible will see at 
a glance that such is the case, for there are hosts of 
Tionest readers of the Bible who do not see it. Our con- 
fident author himself seems to fail to see it long enough 
to write a single paragraph. Before he has written ten 
lines he bids adieu to the explication which he affirms 
"eyery honest reader of the Bible will see at a glance,'^ 
and says of Paul, " For his own sake, he desires to die 
and depart.^^ He forgets that when people die they do 
not go to Christ, but are generally put in the grave. 
If Paul desired to die he would hardly have said, " yet 
what I shall choose {clioosGy in iho, sense of selecting 
with a view to possession, cannot properly represent the 
expression of Paul, for the right of clioice^ in that sense, 
did not rest with him. What Paul would prefer) " I 
wot (know) not," for had he desired death he would 
most assuredly have ^re/ermZ it; but so far from this 
he expressed a difficulty in concluding which he would 
prefer. 

Claiming that Paul possessed a deathless soul which 
was the real man, it is assum.ed that the "I,'' spoken of 
as being "in the flesh," was Paul's immortal soul-entity; 
and then it is immediately said that lie, Paid, the sam.-i 
"I," desired "to die." Think of it, dear reader: an un 



REVIEW OF "REV. I^. D. GEORGE." 103 

dying, a deathless soul desiring to die! This is a 
strangely illogical and inconsistent way of complicating 
matters ; but then, the theory compels it. 

What did Paul mean by in the flesli f Why, in a 
state of mortality, of course. When he said flesh and 
blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God," what did he 
mean? Was it that there will be no material bodies 
in the kingdom of God? None, we thinkp will assert it. 
He meant that there will be no natural, mortal, cor- 
ruptible bodies there, for all subjects of the resurrection 
will put on immortality," be raised spirihial bodies. 

According to my earnest expectation and my hope, 
that in nothing I shall be ashamed, but that with all 
boldness as always, so now also, Christ shall be mag- 
nified in my body (me), whether it be by life, or by 
death. For me to live is Christ." (Christ what ? Why, 
Christ magnified, for Paul says Christ shall be magni- 
fied by his life,) "and to die is gain." (Gain to Paul ? 
No, not necessarily, though in some respects death must 
have been looked upon by him as gain to himself. Gain 
to Christ: Paul says Christ shall be magnified by his 
death ; and in that respect PauFs death would be gain 
to Christ.) "But if I live in thefiesh" (this state of 
mortality) "this" (Christ magnified) "is the fruit of my 
labor ; yet what I shall choose I wot " (know) " not. 
For I am in a strait betwixt two, having a desire to de- 
part and to be with Christ, which is far better." 

Paul was in a strait betwixt two ; and the fact that he 
did not know how to make choice between them is pret- 
ty good evidence that he did not believe in going to 
glory at death ; as, had he done so, he could quickly 
have decided the matter. His " desire to depart, and to 



104 MA^iJ" KOT IMMORTAL. 

be with Christ could not, therefore, have been one ol 
the straits betwixt which he was. 

SpeakiDg of a time when he and his brethren were 
terribly persecuted in Asia, "pressed out of measure 
above strength, insomuch that" they "despaired even 
of life/^ Paul says : " We had the sentence of death in 
ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in 
God which raiseth the dead: who delivered us from so 
great a death, and dost deliver: in whom we trust that 
he will yet deliver us." Thus it is iseen that when 
death stared Paul in the face he had no desire to meet it, 
but if it were the Lord's will that he should then suffer 
it, his trust was not that he^ or any part of him, should 
be glorified in death, but that he should be raised from 
the dead to eternal glory. 

Again says Paul, Phil. ii. 27: "Fe^r indeed he" 
(Epaphroditus) "was sick nigh unto de^^-th; but God 
had mercy on him." Epaphroditus was Paul's fellow 
soldier and companion in labor. Sicknessf had stricken 
him down, and it is proper to infer from the language 
used, that his physical sufferings were eqml unto death 
itself. Would it, then, have been an act of mercy on 
the part of God to have restored his servant to a life 
fraught with all the sorrows resulting from great per- 
secution instead of instantly relieving him from all his 
trials by transferring him right to glory, if taking saints 
there at death is a part of God's plan? Onr theory 
enables us to readily perceive why Paul regarded the 
restoration of Epaphroditus to health, as an acf^of mercy 
upon both of them, while those occupying the^ so- called^ 
orthodox stand-point must, we think, recogni;*^ an utter 
inability, on the part of any, to conceive h>w" either 



REVIEW OF ^^REV. IsT. D. GEORGE." 105 

Paul or Epaphrodifcus could see in it the bestowal of any 
mercy upon the latter. 

The two straits we conceive to be life and death, 
Paul plainly stated that in either case it would be gain 
to Christ, inasmuch as he (Christ) Was to be magnified. 

Paul always represented death as undesirable; and 
subjected, as he was, to sore trials and afflictions, per- 
secuted on all sides, oftimes suffering more than death, 
daily ; deserted and harassed by many from whom he 
had reason to expect the most faithful co-operation and 
enduring loye, he could not look upon life as desirable ; 
so, neither of the two being desirable, he knew not which 
to choose (prefer), for he desired, though he did not, 
perhaps, expect, a third and very much better thing tha]3 
either of the two, which was to " depart,'^ by translation, 
*^ and to be with Christ." 

Translation being preferable to either life or death, 
there was nothing strange or unnatural in Paul's desiring 
it. There are times when all God's faithful ones thus 
feel. They would hail with joy unspeakable the coming 
of our dearly loyed Eedeemer, to relieve us from the 
fetters of mortality, and instantaneously change us from 
a natural, or animal to a spiritual existence. Paul tells 
us, " the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a 
shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the 
trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first: 
then we which are alive and remain, shall be caught up 
together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in 
the air; and so shall we ever be with the Lord." That 
will be " translation " to all saints who are then alive. 
Belsham writes: 

^' It is commonly inferred from this text, and with 



106 



MA^S'" KOT I3i:iI0RTAL. 



some appearance of plausibility, that the. apostle ex- 
pected to be introduced into a state of activity and 
happiness immediately after death ; but this conclusion 
is inconsistent with his doctrine in the epistles to tliB 
Corinthians and the Thessalonians, where he represents 
the happiness of a future life as entirely dependent upon 
a resurrection from the dead; without which he assures 
them that their faith is vain, and all who had fallen asleep 
in Christ had perished. 1 Thess. iy. 13, 14; 1 Cor. xy. 
12-18. To make the apostle, therefore, consistent with 
himself, we must understand him as comparing the pres- 
ent state with that which Y*^ill take place immediately 
after the resurrection, and accounting as nothing the in- 
tervening lapse of time. iN ot, indeed, upon the meta- 
physical, however just, supposition, that the interval of 
thousands of ages is in reality nothing; but, because 
the apostle, and all the Christians in that age, believed 
that the second appearance of Christ to raise the dead, 
and judge the world, would take place in the course 
of a very few years, so that some who were then living 
would be witnesses to that awful event. It is upon this 
ground that he regarded as nothing the few years which 
he supposed would elapse before the resurrection of the 
dead. See 1 Thess. iv. 15.^' ; 

Dr. Priestly remarks : 

" Nothing can be inferred from this text in favor of 
an intermediate state between death and the resurrec- 
tion. For the apostle, considering his own situation, 
would naturally connect the end of this life with the 
commencement of another and a better, as he would 
have no perception of any interval between them.. That 
the apostle had no view to any state short of the com- 
ing of Christ to judgment, is evident from the phrase 
he makes use of, viz., being with Christ, which can only 
take place at his second coming. For Christ himself 
has said that he would come again, and that he would 



REVIEW OF ^'EEV. IsT. D. GEORGE.'' 107 

' take his disciples to himself ; which clearly implies that 
they were not to be with him before that time. 

Accordingly^ for many centuries after the notion of 
an intermediate state was advanced, a notion which was 
the foundation of the doctrine of purgatory, and many 
other absurd and mischievous opinions and practices in 
the church of Eome, and of no good whatever, it was 
never imagined that departed souls were to be with 
Christ, but only in a place under ground called Hades, 
where they were to wait till the resurrection of their 
bodies, at which time, and not before, it was supposed 
that they would be with Christ. The opinion, of the 
soul going immediately to heaven, was not advanced 
with any degree of confidence by any Christians except 
the Gnostics, who believed in no resurrection at all, till 
about a thousand years after Christ.'' 

Says the venerable Bishop Law, " The Scriptures, in 
speaking of the connection between our present and our 
future being, doth not take into the account our inter- 
mediate state in death, no more than we, in describing 
the course of any man's actions, take in the time he 
sleeps. Therefore the Scripture must affirm an im- 
mediate connection between death and judgment, Heb, 
ix. 28, and represent the coming of Christ as near at 
hand, James v. 8, 9." — Law^s Inquiry^ App. No, xiiL 
xiv. Milton says of the words to be with Christ : 

" That is, at his appearing, which all the believers 
hoped and expected was then at hand. In the same 
manner one who is going on a voyage desires to set sail 
and to arrive at a destined port, such is the order in 
which his wishes arrange themselves, omitting all notice 
of the intermediate passage. If, however, it be true 
that there is no time without motion, which Aristotle 
illustrates by the example of those who were fabled to 
have slept in the temple of the heroes, and who, on 



108 



MAl^ IsOT IM3I0ETAL. 



awaking, imagined that the moment in which they Toke 
had succeeded without an interval to that in which they 
fell asleep ; how much more must intervening time be 
annihilated to the departed (for, the dead,) so that to 
them, to die and to be with Christ will seem to take 
place at the same moment ? Christ himself, however, 
expressly indicates the time at which we shall be with 
him ; John xiv. 3, ^ if I go and prepare a place for you, 
I will come again and receive you unto myself j that 
where I am, there ye may be also/ ^' 

Archbishop Whately says some perhaps have found a 
difficulty in reconciling the expressions of Paul, 1 Thess. 
iv. 13, where he speaks of them which are asleep and 
ver. 14, ^^them which sleep in Jesus,^^ w^ith Phil. i. 23, 
and ha then remarks that they may be reconciled to- 
gether on the supposition of a state of sleep between 
death and the resurrection. He further says : 

" If a man were seemingly at the point of death in 
some painful disease, and v/ere asked what he thought 
of Ms oivn prospects, he would be likely to answer, ' I 
long to be released from my sufferings, and to be with 
Christ ; ' for I believe that, to my own perception, the 
instant death closes my eyes, I shall be awakened by 
the last trump — the summons to meet my Lord. And 
though, in relation to you the survivors, my dying this 
hour or a year hence makes no difference as to the time 
when that day shall arrive, to me it makes all the differ- 
ence: . . . relatively to me, it does, to all practical pur- 
poses, come the sooner, the sooner I am released from 
the burden of 'this earthly tabernacle.' ... It is thus 
then that the apostle Paul, or any other sincere Chris- 
tian loould express himself, supposing him to have such 
a belief. And just thus it is that Paul does express 
himself. When he is administering comfort to the sur- 
vivors respecting their brethren who have departed in 



REVIEW OF "EEY. IST. D. GEORGE." 109 

the Lord, he always speaks of them as ^asleep/ ... On 
the other hand, when he speaks of his eager longing ^to 
depart and to be^ (it is the substantive verb, to exist,) 
* with Christ,' he is speaking of himself, solely, without 
any reference to the perceptions and feelings of the sur- 
vivors, but only to his own. ISTow in respect to his own 
perceptions, the moment of his breathing his last in 
this world would be, a-s has been said, instantly succeed- 
ed (on the supposition of total insensibility during the 
interval) by that of his awakening in the presence of his 
Lord.'' 

Thus we see that these learned men, these master- 
minds do not find the doctrine of soul survivance in 
death taught in the passage under consideration. No 
Christian person will even intimate that they were not 
lionest readers of the Bible. We trust all those who 
have not yet done so will soon realize that wisdom 
will not be likely to die with the man who is thus reck- 
less in statement. Paul was not inconsistent with him- 
self; and we shall ere long see that his teachings not 
only give no countenance to the theory of inherent im- 
mortality but positively forbid faith in it. 

That Paul, by the expression, " having a desire to 
depart, and to be with Christ," meant that he desired to 

is a truly singular position for those to take who, 
believing that Christ now sits at the right hand of God 
in heaven, affirm that Paul's soul, together with other 
disembodied ones, is in hades, and so cannot be with 
Christ until the resurrection. It involves either, first : 
that Paul was ignorant of what would be his condition 
immediately after death ; or, second : that Cod's throne 
is located in hades ; or, third : that Paul did not be- 
lieve that he would go to Christ when he died. They 



110 



MAIST ^s^OT IMMOKTAL. 



can take their choice of these positions^ the first and 
second of which are, so far as we know, equally absurd, 
and certainly at variance with the testimony of inspira- 
tion. As the third is douUUss true, it being in harmony 
with the Word, we are free to recommend it. 

Paet IL 

" I knew a man in Christ about fourteen years ago, (wliether 
in the body, I cannot tell; or whether out of the body, I cannot 
tell ; God knoweth :) such an one caught up to the third iieav(;n/^ 
—2 Cor. xii. 2. 

I]sr order to press this text into the service of their 
theory, advocates of inherent immortality assume that 
Paul is not talking in verse 2 of what he directs atten- 
tion to in verse 1. This assumption, we are free to af- 
firm, is equally bold and unwarrantable. Says the Apos- 
tle, verse 1, I will come to visions and revelations of 
the Lord." Of the expression, I tuill come to visions, 
Dr. Adam Clarke remarks: "Symbolical representa- 
tions of spiritual and celestial things ; in which matters 
of the deepest importance are exhibited to the eye of the 

Paul gives account of a certain item of his expe- 
rience, as follows : " And it came to pass, that when I 
was come again to Jerusalem, even while I prayed in 
the temple, I was in a trance.'^— Acts xxii. 17. It is, of 
course, impossible to say with certainty whether this is 
the occurrence of which Paul speaks in his second 
epistle to the Corinthians, but we deem it quite reason- 
able to suppose such is the case, for there is evidence 
that he was in Jerusalem about the time that he says he 
had the vision and revelation. 



KEVIEW OF ^'EEY. D. GEORGE." Ill 

It is generally believed that the second epistle to 
Corinth was written A. D. 57. Fourteen years back 
(I knew a man in Christ about fourteen years ago) 
would be A. D. 43, just about the time that Paul and 
Barnabas were sent from Antioch as bearers of relief 
unto the brethren which dwelt in Judea." Thus it 
is not improbable that the vision which he had in the 
temple, while in trance state, is that to which he refers. 
This opinion was entertained by Dr. Benson, Dr. Adam 
Clarke, and Dr. Priestly, the last of whom remarks: 
"Paul did not know whether he was carried up into 
the third heaven, or whether it was only a vision. That 
it was a vision, is much the most probable." 

Kev. Thomas Belsham, in his notes on the epistles of 
Paul, writes thus : 

'^Here we may observe, that though through modesty 
the apostle conceals his name, yet it is plain from the 
connexion, that he could mean no one but himself who 
was thus highly favored. And further, that the whole 
was probably a visionary scene ; and that by the expres- 
sion, in the body or out of the iocli/, he does not mean 
to decide any thing concerning the metaphysical nature 
of the soul, and a state of intermediate existence, but 
merely to say, that the expression was so vivid that he 
could not ascertain whether it was a real fact, or a scenic 
representation supernaturally exhibited to his mind. 
Vv^e may be well satisfied that it was the latter; because 
there is no such place as that which the gross philos- ' 
ophy of the Jews called the third heaven. . . . Paul im- 
agined himself transported into the third heaven; but 
this no more proves the existence of such a place, than 
the representations impressed upon the imagination 
of Isaiah, Ezekiel, and John, are proofs of the real ex- 
ternal existence of those places which they saw in vision, 



112 



MA]N" iTOT IMMORTAL. 



Paul saw and heard what lie was either not permitted, 
or not able, to describe. It is therefore yain and useless 
to form any conjecture upon the subject. There can be 
no doubt that it answered the purpose intended, of 
strengthening the apostle's mind, extending his views, 
confirming his faith, and improving his qualifications 
lor his apostolic ofiice.^^ 

Mr. George affirms of the passage under considera- 
tion : " This clearly teaches that there is a conscious en- 
tity which can exist in the body or out of the body.'^ 
In contrast to this assertion we quote from Dr. Clarke, 
who says : " That the apostle was in an ecstacy or traiice, 
something like that of Peter, Acts x. 10, there is reason 
to believe ; but we know that, being carried literally into 
heaven, was possible to the Almighty. But as he could 
not decide himself, it v/ould be ridiculous in us to at- 
tempt it.'^ We agree with the Dr., though we should 
hardly have felt willing to speak so plainly concerning 
the affirmation noted. That it is possible to the Al- 
mighty to carry people literally to heaven, the experi- 
ence of Enoch, of Elijah, and of our Saviour fully at- 
test. Peter also ^^fell into a trance, and saw heaven open- 
ed." Did a spirit-entity leave the body, and go to heav- 
en and see it open ? Certainly not; but he saw in the 
trance vision " a certain vessel descending unto him." 

"And it came to pass ... as I sat in mine house, 
and the elders of Judah sat before me, that the hand of 
the Lord God fell upon me. And he put forth the form 
of an hand, and took me by a lock of mine head ; and 
the Spirit lifted me up between the earth and the heav- 
en, and brought me in the visions of God to Jerusalem." 
Ezek. viii. 1-3. The prophet was not taken bodily to 



REVIEW OE ^^EEY. K. D. GEORGE." 113 

Jerusalem, for he was all the while with " the elders of 
Judah," who sat before him. Was a spirit-entity sep- 
arated from him and taken to Jerusalem ? Not unlesa 
it had a literal head, with literal locks upon it, for " he 
put forth the form of an hand, and took me by a lock of 
mine head." All will at once see that Ezekiel simply 
had a vision, an experience shared by Peter, by Paul, and 
still later by John, on Patmos; and any one of the in- 
stances teaches that man possesses an entity capable of 
conscious existence separately from the body, equally 
with either of the others, which is precisely not at all. 

If, as is affirmed, Paul had such an entity, or, which 
is a more consistent way of stating it, Paul luas such an 
entity, then when he was out of the body the body must 
haye been dead, for physical death, it is claimed, con- 
sists in the separation of soul and body. From this con- 
clusion, ridiculous as it is, there is no escape. An Eng- 
lish writer, endeavoring to shun the dilemma, produces 
the following: 

" We may conceive the soul to receive a supernatural 
vision, either while it remaineth still in the body, or by 
its departing from the body for a season. The latter 
may not be called death, because either the sensitive, or 
at least the vegetative, soul or faculty continues mean- 
while in the body, either naturally or miraculously yiv* 
ifying it." 

So, then, man, as beheld in every-day life, consists 
of three distinct parts, viz., a body and two souls, one 
of these latter being the essential and ruling party, 
while the other is a lower, a sort of grovelling, ^- veg- 
etative " fellow, a part of whose business it is to stay at 
home and keep house, having every thing snug and warm 



114 



MA^T N"OT IMMORTAL. 



for the return of the master-spirit Lange's Commen- 
tary, in which the above singular language is not alto- 
gether unapprovingly quoted, sometimes favors a some- 
what similar style of reasoning, and takes nearly the 
same ground. There is so much in the position which 
reminds one of its heathen origin, it cannot be thought 
eminently calculated to deceive. 

If our friends on the other side of the question will 
have error in preference to truth, we have no special 
objection to their enjoying whatever of comfort can be 
derived from such philosophy, but we cannot hold 
them quite justifiable or even unblame worthy in deceiv- 
ing the unthoughtful by pretending to find it in the 
word of Grod. We do object to the practice indulged by 
many theologians, of adopting certain conclusions of a 
false philosophy and, taking advantage of the credulity 
of the ignorant, imposing those conclusions upon their 
fellow-beings as Scriptural truth. 

What Mr. Lee remarks on the subject of inspiration, 
we conceive to have been the experience of Paul on the 
occasion to which he refers. Lee says : " The infusion 
of spiritual influences supersedes at the same time the 
■usual succession of ideas and the ordinary current of 
thought; the power of imagination alone remaining ac- 
tive, and the sense of spiritual vision being excited to 
the highest degree of intensity.'' We are justified in 
the confidence that they who think 2 Cor. xii 2 affords 
any evidence of inherent immortality are supported in 
the opinion by few indeed among the thinkers of even 
the spirit-entity faith. They must go to heathen phi- 
losophy, the origin of the theory, for proof to sustain it: 
the Bible does not teach that kind of immortality. The 



HEVIEW OF "EEY. D. GEORGE." 



115 



^nife and immortality " which it brings to light comes by 
a resurrection from the dead, through Jesus Christ. 

Paet III. 

" Marvel not at this : for the hour is coming, in the which all 
that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth ; 
they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life, and they 
that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation." — John 
V, 23, 29. 

We will not dwell at any length on this text, what 
we conceive to be the meaning of it not being in the 
range of our present purpose ; for whatever the language 
may be thought to import, it will not be regarded by 
any reasonable or logical mind as affording even a hint 
that the wicked will not be destroyed, " annihilated." 

Every reader of the work under review must recognize 
this peculiar and unhappy feature, that whenever the 
author is unable to produce argument having the sem- 
blance of effectiveness, he is pretty sure to immediately 
set to work denouncing some one. We have hereto- 
fore noted some of the numerous instances of this un- 
reasonable, unfortunate and unchristian procedure, and 
now we are again pained at meeting with the following 
concerning "Mr. Storrs, who," he afBrms, "from long 
experience is well skilled in twisting, combining, mis- 
applying ... to say nothing of other resorts," etc. He 
says of the same writer, that he "attacks all Scripture 
which stands in his way, and breaks them down, no mat- 
ter how." Charging upon others a desire to " murder " 
texts is also a seemingly favorite pastime with our ar- 
dent author. 

If we desired only the triumph of truth we would re- 
joice in such displays of creaturely effusion, and would 



116 



MAJT :n'ot immortal. 



wish that all opponents might adopt the same style of 
defending error^ for we hold that no humble, consis- 
tent and honored defender of truth is eyer so secure in 
the exercise of his influence for good as when thus as- 
sailed; but to see reproach thus carelessly brought upon 
the blessed cause of Christ is saddening and humiliating, 
and it would be disheartening as well, did not faith as 
sure us that the Lord will overrule all and amply protect 
his work. 

To the attention of those who accept the text under 
consideration as teaching the popular view, we commend 
the following : " They which shall be accounted worthy 
to obtain that world, and the resurrection from the 
dead, neither marry, nor are given in marriage : neither 
can they die any more : for they are equal unto tho 
angels ; and are the cliildren of God, being the cMl- 
dren of the resurrection.^^ — Luke xx. 35, 36. This text 
admits of no explication which makes the subjects of 
the resurrection other than just what Jesus positively 
declares they will be viz., " children of God, being the 
children of the resurrection.'^ 

Our Saviour did not contradict himself, and hence 
if it be insisted that cdl the dead will live again it must 
also be insisted that Universalism is true, or else deny 
the plainest possible declarations of Christ. Which will 
they do ? The reply of Jesus to the Sadducees is in per- 
fect harmony with all other well understood Scripture 
testimony ; while the popular interpretation of John v. 
28, 29 cannot be harmonized with other Scripture. V/e 
used to think, sometimes, that certain texts of Scrip- 
ture were about to be IroTcen doion, but when the 
smoke of controversy had cleared away, we found the 



REVIEW OF ^^REY. D. GEORGE.'' 117 

texts not only safe and sound but brighter than ever, 
and pouring out their rich treasures of Divine light ; but 
our exjjositions of them were Irolcen doiuii, yet, total 
wreck that they were, we rejoiced in their downfall be- 
cause that downfall was our freedom. 

"We cannot close these remarks without calling the 
reader's attention to the very great improbability of ig- 
norance on the part of the author of " Annihilationism 
not of the Bible/*' of the fact that the writer of whom 
he so unbecomingly speaks, prayerfully seeks to "bring 
out the meaning" of Scripture texts, and in doing so 
has no conflict with any theory which he does not con- 
ceive to be in conflict with the word of God. He may 
err, and he makes no pretensions to infallibilty, but he 
rZes/m the triumph of truth, whatever human theories 
are overthrown. Having only feelings of tenderness 
and love toward all followers of Jesus, we are con- 
strained to suggest to ]Sr. D. George the wisdom of hence- 
forth refraining not only from all such unreasonable 
and false charges, but from all charges of like character, 
for God will yet judge between him and those fellow- 
servants whom he thus smites. 



118 



MAi^* KOT IMMORTAL, 



CHAPTEE VII. 
Paet 1. 

" And after six days Jesiis taketh Peter, James, and Jolin hm 
brother, and bringeth tliem up into an high mountain apart, and 
was transfigured before them : and his face did shine as the sun, 
and his raiment was white as the light. And, behold, there ap- 
peared unto them Moses and Elias, talking with him." — Matt, 
xvii. 1-3. (See also Mark ix. 2-4; Luke ix. 28, 30). 

These texts, like many others that have no reference 
whatever to the subject, and hence cannot, without do- 
ing violence to principles of sound reason, be thought 
to favor the idea of consciousness in death, are not un- 
freqoently urged in support of that theory. As Elijah 
did not die, but was carried bodily up from the earth 
into heaven, we may fairly suppose, it will not be con- 
tended by any that his participation in the scene of 
transfiguration affords, even by the remotest implica- 
tion, the slightest evidence of conscious survivance in 
death. 

With Moses, however, the case is somewhat different, 
for he died and was buried. To those, therefore, who 
base their explication of the text upon the assumption 
that an entity in man (an entity which constitutes, it is . 
held, the 7nan) exists as a living, responsible being 
while the material organization is dead, the circum- 
stance of Moses' presence at the transfiguration seems 
somewhat indicative that a soul-entity survives the death 
of what is termed the body. These should not fail to 
consider the fact that this mode of approaching any 
passage of Scripture, while it may result in strength- 
ening their existing convictions, must of necessity work 



KEVIEW OF "ICEV. D. GEOKGE." 119 

them positive injury if their convictions happen to be 
erroneous. Mr. George remarks : 

^* That the soul survives the body is evinceci by the 
fact that Moses was alive in the time of the Saviour, 
although his body had been dead more than fourteen 
hundred years.^^ — p. 127. 

The reader will perceive the pointed distinction 
here between Moses and Ms locly. Moses was alive "al- 
though Ms hody had been dead more than fourteen hun- 
dred years.^^ This is consistent with the popular theo- 
ry, which makes the material organization no part of 
the m^an proper, the man being an assumed immortal 
part, called the soul; but we will show that it is not con- 
sistent as well with the testimony of inspiration, but is 
directly opposed thereto. It must not be forgotten that 
our "Eev." author and his coadjutors insist that an im- 
material soul was Moses Mmself^ all else being merely 
his body, a mere tenement, its life and sense depending 
upon the presence of the soul. 

^nd the Lord said unto Moses, Get thee up into this 
mouat Abiram, and see the land which I give unto the 
children of Israel. And when thou hast seen it, thou 
also shalt be gathered unto thy people, as Aaron thy 
brother was gathered.^' — Num. xxvii. 12, 13. How was 
Aaron gathered unto his people? And Aaron shall 
be gathered unto his people, and shall die there. . . . 
And Aaron died there in the top of the mount. . . . 
And when all the congregation saw that Aaron was 
dead^ they mourned for Aaron thirty days.^^ — Num. xx. 
26, 28, 29. Moses himself said: "But I must die in 
this land, I must not go over Jordan." — Deut. iv. 22. 
^^So Moses the servant of the Lord died there in 



120 



MAK KOT IMMOKTAL. 



the land of Moab, according to the word of the Lord 
. . . And Moses was an hundred and thirty years old 
when lie died: his eye was not dim, nor his natural 
force abated/^ — Deut. xxxiv. 5, 7. God afterward said 
unto Joshua, " Moses my servant is dead/' If an imma- 
terial entity constituted the intelligent, responsible Mo- 
ses, then that entity must unquestionably have been 
that which served God, and hence was said to be " the 
servant of the Lord/' This conclusion is positively un- 
avoidable ; but it is said, " Moses tlie servant of the Lord 
died/' Therefore, arguing from their own chosen prem- 
ise, our friends of the inherent immortality faith must 
of necessity admit, if at all consistent, that their soul- 
entity Moses died. Then again : why should it be said 
of this soul-entity Moses, that " his eye was not dim," if 
he was immortal and consequently had eyes which 
could not grow dim? And why the expression, "nor 
his natural force abated?" Is such a spiritual and 
immaterial entity as a soul is said to be, possessed of 
natural ioYCQ, which may abate? How many are the 
gross absurdities into which the theory inevitably leads. 
How unfortunate for such a position is it that inspira- 
tion did not say it was only the " body " of Moses that 
died, instead of again and again declaring it was Moses 
himself. Notwithstanding the word of God so plainly 
declares that Moses died and was luried, Mr. George and 
others affirm he did not die, and was not buried. What 
an awful responsibility do they assume who thus speak 
against God. May they yet see their error, and repent 
of it. 

But the question arises, why was not Moses permitted 
to enter the promised inheritance ? In answering this 



REVIEW OF "KEY. IST. D. GEOKGE." 121 

we shall see that other insuperable objections to the 
theory we are considering present themselyes. The 
Lord said to Moses : " Get thee up into this mountain 
Abiram, unto- mount Nebo, which is m the land of Moab, 
that is oyer against Jericho; and behold the land of 
Canaan . . . and die in the mount whither thou goest 
up, and be gathered unto thy people ; as Aaron thy 
brother died in mount Hor, and was gathered unto 
his people: Because ye trespassed against me among 
the children of Israel at the waters of Meribah-Kadesh, 
in the wilderness of Zin/^ — Deut. xxxii. 49, 50, 51. 
Moses gives the following account of an interview with 
God : " 0 Lord God, thou hast begun to show thy ser- 
vant thy greatness, and thy mighty hand : for what God 
is there in heaven or in earth that can do according to 
thy works, and according to thy might ? I pray thee, 
Ist me go over, and see the good land that is beypnd 
Jordan, that goodly mountain, and Lebanon. But the 
Lord was wroth with me for your sakes, and would 
not hear me : and the Lord said unto me. Let it suffice 
thee: speak no more unto me of this matter/^ — Deut. 
iii. 24, 25, 26. See also Psa. cvi. 32, 33. 

Thus we see it was in punisliment for transgres- 
sion that Moses died without entering the promised 
land: it was " because he "tres]passed against the 
Lord among the children of Israel at the waters of 
Meribah Kadesh.^^ The popular theory not only de- 
nies that Moses died^ but it would have us believe that 
God took him to heaven in punishment for transgres- 
sion. Was old Canaan sc much more delightful than 
is heaven that it was a real punishment to Moses to 
keep him out of the one by taking him to the other ? 



122 



MAlSr ]^0T IMMOETAL. 



On the other hand, if the heayen to which latter-day 
theology sends soul-entities immediately at the death of 
what is called the body be far more glorious than 
any part of earth can be, why did Moses, if he believed 
in going there at death, pray so feryently to be permit- 
ted to cross oyer to and liye in Canaan ? 

To suppose the chosen leader of Israel capable of 
such pleading for permission to remain longer out of a 
place of unalloyed happiness is to suspect him of the 
greatest folly. If the prophet and leader had plead Is- 
rael's need of his longer presence with them the case 
would be quite different, but he does not intimate any 
ground for his desire to enter the inheritance other than 
the pleasure it would afford him, and, of course, the 
longer life which the granting of his prayer would in- 
volye. 

ISTo Scripture truth can be better established than 
that Moses himself (not his body merely, as ia so con- 
fidently asserted) died. What, then, follows as an in- 
eyitable conclusion ? Why, that if he was present at 
the transfiguration he was first raised from the dead ; 
and hence his appearance upon that occasion cannot 
be considered as affording the faintest indication that 
any 2^cirt of man, much less the man himself, exists in 
a conscious state between death and the resurrection. 

It is objected to the spirit-entity theory, that, "if 
only Moses' immaterial soul was there it could not be 
seen by mortal eyes." In reply to this it is urged that 
" separate spirits " can be invested with form, and thus 
"present themselves to material eyes." Since it would 
have required quite as great display of omnipotent pow- 
er to furnish the immaterial Moses with a temporary 



REVIEW OF "REV. D. GEORGE." 123 

form in precise likeness to the natural as it did id raise 
him from the dead^ we cannot keenly appreciate the 
decided preference of our opponents for the supposition 
that the former miracle was wrought, and especially as 
the Moses who appeared was the Moses whom inspira- 
tion declares died ; nor can we account for the exist- 
ence of that preference in any other way than that they 
fully recognize the fact that the admission of the resur- 
rection of Moses would be an acknowledgment that the 
text in no wise favors their theory. That they should 
first prove an existence of immaterial soul-entities which 
may be invested with form, and thus " present them- 
selves to mortal eyes," is an obligation which they per- 
sistently ignore, obvious though it is. Why is this? 
Simply because such an existence is not susceptible of 
proof, it having nothing more substantial and reliable 
than bare assumption to support it. If a thing is reveal- 
ed in the word of God it need not be assumed ; if not 
thus revealed, it should not be assumed. To all, then, 
we would say, " be ready always to give an answer to 
every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is 
in you.'^ How immeasurably would Christendom be 
advantaged if men were as energetic in search for truth 
as they are in defence of error. 

Dr. Adam Clarke, speaking of the transfiguration, in 
connection with the resurrection of the dead and chang- 
ing of those who are alive at the coming of Christ, 
says : 

" He probably gave the full representation of this in 
the person of Moses, who died, and was thus raised to 
life, (or appeared as he shall appear when raised from 
the dead at the last day ;) and in the person of Elijah, 



124 



MA^T :n"Ot immoktal. 



who neyer tasted death. Both their bodies exhibit the 
same appearance, to show, that the bodies of glorified 
saints are the same, whether the person had been trans- 
lated, or whether he had died." 

Prof. Mattison, a learned Methodist, once publish- 
ed a work entitled Spirit Eajopings Unveiled, in which, 
in connection with a statement of what he supposed^' 
to have occasioned the ^ dispute^ between Michael the 
archangel and satan ^ about the body of Moses," spoken 
of by Jude, he remarks : 

If this explanation is correct, (and to say the least, 
it is highly probable,) it affords much ground for the 
belief that God has settled the ' dispute ^ by raising the 
body of Moses from the dead, and that he appeared on 
the Mount of transfiguration precisely as Elias appear- 
ed." 

The command of Jesus, Tell the vision to no man 
till the Son of man be risen from the dead," suggests the 
possibility, perhaps probability, that the projDhet and 
the law-giver were not personally present at the trans- 
figuration, but were rejoresented. As Christ was declared 
to be " the first-born from the dead " (to an incorrupti- 
ble life) "that in all things he might have the pre-em- 
inence/' Col. i. 18, " the first-fruit of them that slept,'' 
1 Cor. XV. 20, we are forced to the conclusion that if 
Moses was raised from the dead it was only temporarily. 
That the transaction was a vision, an a])pearance, is re- 
garded as quite probable by Dr. Clarke, who thinks that 
Moses was either raised to life " or ai^peared now as he 
shall appear ^ulien raised from the dead at the last day." 

If Moses and Elijah were personally present, we may 
reasonably conclude that as the " Law and the ProjDh- 
ets " were connected, and as Christ was " the end of the 



REYIEW OF ^^REY. iT. D. GEOHGE." 125 

law/^ the laiu in the person of Moses, the legislator ; 
and the prophets, represented by Elijah, were brought 
together to formally render up their authority unto the 
Messiah. This seems to be rendered the more reason- 
able by Luke's account, chap. ix. 31, that the three talk- 
ed of " his decease which he should accomplish at Jer- 
ri salem.'^ 

The soul-entity theory derives no support whatever 
from the account of the transfiguration in any just ex- 
position. On the contrary it may properly be held to 
ojDpose it. 

Part II. 

"But they were terrified and affriglited, and supposed they 
had seen a spirit." — Luke xxiv. 37. 

Ik Matt. xiy. 26, " they were troubled, saying, It is a 
spirit,'^ the word is pliantasma ; and Griesbach, a yery 
excellent authority, has given the same word in this 
passage. Pliantasma, or a phantasm is described by 
Webster as, " an image formed by the mind, and sup- 
posed to be real ; an imaginary existence which seems to 
be real ; a shadowy or airy appearance ; sometimes an 
optical illusion.^' All will at once see that the text can- 
not with reason or consistency be claimed as affording 
evidence of a separate conscious existence of any part of 
man when the other part is dead, and hence to multi- 
ply words in elucidation of what is already suflB.eient- 
ly clear would be a waste of time and eflFort. 

It is said the soul or spirit is " immaterial, uncom- 
jjoiinded, indivisible. To claim, therefore, that the apos- 
tles were affrighted because they thought they saw an ex- 
istence the very nature of which, a fact they would not 



126 



MAiT JSrOT IMMORTAL. 



have been unaware of, precludes its being seen, is to urge 
that they were to some extent subjects of dementation. 
Until popular theology gives to the world a new defini- 
tion or description of its fancied spirit-entity it can lay 
no claim to this text, unless, indeed, it is willing to ad- 
mit that the spirit-entity idea is a phantasm. 

Pakt IIL 

"Kow that the dead are raised, eyen Moses shewed at the bush, 
■when he calleth the Lord the God of Abraham, and the God 
of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For God is not the God of the 
dead, but of the living : for all live unto him." — Luke xx. 37^ 38. 

"Were we not well aware of the extent to which many 
expositors and others indulge the habit of severing pas- 
sages of Scripture from their connections, and arraying 
them in seeming support of certain dogmas, we would 
never cease to wonder how it is that not a few men of 
intelligence and thought conceive that the above words 
of Jesus afford evidence of man's immortality. Quoting, 
with entire approval, from Mr. Landis, it is said, p. 137 
of the work under review : 

" The Sadducees believed that man ceased utterly to 
exist at death, and, consequently, they denied his resur- 
rection.^' 

This statement is, of course, framed to strengthen an 
exposition, but, as all must see, it is put wrong end fore- 
most. Had it been said, the Sadducees denied a resur- 
rection, and, consequently, they consistently believed that 
man ceased utterly to exist at death, the assertion would 
have possessed the very attractive and exalted merit of 
truthfulness, and would have commended itself to the 
judgment of every thoughtful person. Again : 

^^But he'' (Jesus) "aimed at something more: for, 



REVIEW OF '^KEY. iq-. D. GEORGE." 127 

had he simply proved a future resurrection, the Saddu- 
cees would still have objected that there was no such 
thing as a spirit; while, if the existence of the spirit after 
death is proved, the resurrection, as they viewed the 
matter, followed of course. Our Saviour, therefore, in 
order to disprove their views on both of these points, re- 
fers to Exod. iii. 6, 16, which affirms that God was still 
the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, though they had 
been long dead ; and upon which he also remarks, that 
* God is not tJie God of tlie dead\ . . 'hit of the living f 
and then, directly in the face of their theory, he adds, 
*for all live unto him'; that is, so far is man from ceas- 
ing to exist at death, as ye Sadducees pretend, that, even 
though they have ceased to be seen on earth, all that are 
dead still live to him,'' 

We think the reader will agree with us in the opinion 
that should a man set to work to do his utmost in that 
direction, he could scarcely hope to succeed in crowding 
into a few sentences so much of sophistry, and so many 
mistatements and contradictions, mingled with some 
truth apparently unmeaningly uttered, as is contaiiKd 
in the foregoing extract. Mr. George distinctly affirms, 
and he repeatedly reasons upon the assumption, that 
man does not die, only something connected with him, 
which, when the man leaves it, is only the remains '^ 
of a man. He urges, moreover, that Jesus so taught. 
In accordance with this position, it is insisted that our 
{Saviour, by way of proving a resurrection, a reliving 
again of dead persons, substantially said to the Saddu- 
cees, " Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are not dead, as ye 
suppose, but are still living, therefore they will be raised 
from the dead," Profound logic ! a kind, however, for 
which Messrs. Landis and George will not, we venture to 
say, receive the thanks of the more consistent members 



128 



MAZSr KOT imiORTAL. 



of their school. He must be firmly wedded indeed to a 
theory, and determined to sustain it at all hazards, who 
will deliberately attribute to our blessed Sayiour such a 
style of reasoning. 

Suppose Jesus liad told the Sadducees that man pos- 
sesses an undying spirit-entity: they would, mostlikely, 
still have replied, " well, that can be no proof of a resur- 
rection, for if those spirit-entities exist now in a separate 
state why may they not always so exist? Their ex- 
istence cannot prove that there will be a resurrection of 
the dead. If what thou sayest, that ' God is not the God 
of the dead, but of the liying; for all live unto him/ 
proves that some part of man is alive when the other 
part is dead, then our doctrine, that the dead will not 
live again, is established, for God, not being the God of 
the dead, will not raise them up again.^^ A child can 
easily see that the argument imputed to Jesus would be 
altogether likely to confirm the Sadducees in their belief 
rather than convince them of their error, for to affirm, as 
is done, that the language, " God is not the God of the 
dead, but of the living,^' proves that some part of Abra- 
ham, Isaac and Jacob did not die, is ^ to deny that so 
mu-ch of those patriarchs as did die^ will ever live again. 
Thus the resurrection, the very doctrine which Jesus un- 
dertook to prove, and did prove, is denied. 

Look at this : 

"If the existence of the spirit after death is proved, 
the resarrection, as they viewed the matter, followed of 
course.'^ 

Followed of course ! Let Mr. George go to some of 
the hundreds of thousands of professing Christians of to- 
day, who believe in the immortality of the soul, but who 



REVIEW OF ^'EEV. D. GEORGE/^ 129 

deny a resurrection of the dead simply leccnisG they be- 
lieve man possesses an immortal entity, and he will 
quickly learn whether or not it is seen thai the resur- 
rection^^ follows as a matter "of course/' If it follows 
as a matter of course, pray tell us why the inevitable 
tendency of belief in it to denial of a resurrection ? The 
Gnostics were the only Christians in the early days of 
the church, we believe, who, as a body, held to the im- 
mortality of the soul, and they, like many in the present 
day, not seeing any necessity for a resurrection, the real 
man being better off in the fancied disembodied state, 
denied the resurrection of dead persons. 

Does it, then, follow " of course ? Not so thonght 
Justyn Martyr, who said: "If, therefore, you fall in 
with certain men that are called Christians, who con- 
fess not this truth (the resurrection) " but dare to 
blaspheme the God of Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob; 
in that they say there is no resurrection of the dead, 
lut that immediately when they die their souls are re- 
ceived up into heaven — avoid them and esteem them not 
Christians." Nor did so think Wm. Tyndale, the martyr, 
who, replying to a Platonist who attacked the doctrines 
of Luther, said: "In putting departed souls in heaven, 
hell, and purgatory, you destroy the argument wliere- 
with Christ and Paul prove the resurrection." Darby, 
a so-called, orthodox writer, says : "It was just when the 
coming oj Christ tuas denied in the church, or at least 
began to be lost sight of, that the doctrine of the im- 
mortality of the soul came in to replace that of the 
resurrection,^^ 

"We assert that the tendency of belief in the conscious 
existence of a spirit-entity between death and resurrec- 



130 



MAK KOT IMMOETAL. 



tion is not only to vjeaken faith in the resurrection, but 
to destroy it altogether, a result it has accomplished in 
myriads of cases. Notwithstanding the doctrine of the 
resurrection was constantly insisted upon by the apostles 
and early fathers, comparatiyely few Christians of the 
present time attach any importance to it. 

Why the change? Simply because men have learned 
to believe, in opposition to the plain testimony of inspi- 
ration, that a part of man (the real mmi) lives on at 
death, and, if holy, is unspeakably happy ; and hence 
little or no necessity for a resurrection exists. He who 
holds that a belief in the idea of consciousness in death 
leads, as a matter of course,^^ to belief in a resurrec- 
tion of the dead, has a theory which is opposed to pal- 
pable facts. But he may possibly say with another, " so 
much the worse for the facts." The doctrine of the im- 
mortality of the soul had its origin in the fact that men 
were seen to die, and turn to dust, and it not being seen 
how they could ever live again, and their identity be re- 
stored, it was concluded that a part of man lived on. 

The truth is unwittingly uttered in the remarks that 
call attention to the reference of Jesus to certain Scrip- 
ture " which affirms that God was still the God of Abra- 
ham, Isaac and Jacob, though they had been long dead^^ 
but the citation completely overthrows our author's own 
argument. He insists that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob 
are not dead. Yes, the truth is plainly spoken when 
it is said that Jesus refers to Scripture " which affirms 
that God was still the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, 
though they had been long deadP 

The language, therefore, God is not the God of the 
dead, but of the living; for all live unto him," must of 



REVIEW OF "REY. D. GEORGE.'^ 131 

necessity have reference to something else than life in 
present actual possession. What is that something else ? 
In what peculiar sense is God the God of Abraham^ Isaac 
and Jacob, though they have been lojig dead? And ho^7 
does the fact that he is their God prove that they will be 
raised from the dead ? We shall see. 

TJnto Abraham God made certain promises of a spe- 
cific character (see Gen. xxii). These promises were 
substantially repeated to Isaac to whom it was said : I 
will perform the oath which I sware unto Abraham thy 
father (see Geni^ xxvi. 2, 5). Jehovah afterward re- 
newed the promises to Jacob, prefacing them with this 
assurance : " I am the Lord God of Abraham thy father, 
and the God of Isaac. • . . And, beholdj I am with tliGG, 
and will keep thee in all places whither thou goest^^ 
(see Gen. xxviii. 13-15). Thus we see that in order that 
these ancient worthies might Tciioiu that the promises 
would be fulfilled, even though tJiey might not be able 
to see lioiv that fulfillment would or could be accomplish- 
ed, the Lord announced himself their God. 

This assurance was given to Moses also, as follows : 
I am the God of thy fathers, and the God of Abraham, 
and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." Why 
did God make this declaration to Moses ? Doubtless to 
assure the prophet that the promises to his fathers were 
not forgotten, and though the patriarchs had died with- 
out seeing a fulfillment of them, they nevertheles would 
yet be fulfilled. Abraham, when as yet he and Sarah 
had no children, believed God would perform the promise 
of giving him a multitudinous seed: and when he went 
to offer up his only son, the child of pron^ise, it was in 



133 



MAX KOT IMMORTAL. 



the full confidence that " God was able to raise him,^ 
(Isaac^) ^^up;, even from the dead/^ 

Well, were the promises made, for instance, to Abra- 
ham personally, fulfilled during his life-time? Let U8 
see. Stephen, in his last address, declared : " Men, 
brethren and fathers, hearken ; the God of glory appear- 
ed unto our father Abraham, when he was in Meso- 
potamia, before he dwelt in Charran, and said unto him, 
Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and 
come into the land which I shall show thee. Then came 
he out of the land of the Chaldeans, and dwelt in Char- 
ran : and from thence, when his father was dead, he re- 
moved him into this land, wherein ye now dwell. And 
he gaye him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as 
to set his foot on : yet he promised that he would give it 
to him for a possession.'^ — Acts vii. 2-5. 

Now, what have we here ? We have the undeniable 
fact that God promised Abraham a certain country for an 
inheritance, but never gave him, during his life-time, 
"so much as to set his foot on.'' What follow^s ? Why, 
God being still his God, Abraham is, unto God, reckon- 
ed as alive, because he is to h^raised from the dead to re- 
ceive the idvomised inheritance. Thus it is that Moses 
showed the resurrection of the dead when he called God 
" the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the 
God of Jacob." 

Paul declared concerning certain worthies, of whom 
were Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, "These all died in 
faith, not having received the promises, but having seen 
them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and em- 
braced them, and confessed that they were strangers and 
pilgrims on the earth. For they that say such things, 



TvEYIEW OF "EEV. N^. D. GEORGE.'^ 133 

declare plainly that they seek a country . . . Wherefore 
God is not ashamed to be called their God ; for he hath 
prepared for them a city/^ Because of their faith and 
works of faith, "God is not ashamed to be called their 
God/^ and " he hath prepared for them a city/^ Have 
they receiyed that which God hath prepared for them ? 
'No, in no wise, for if there was any thing about them 
which did not die it was not a subject of promise, be- 
cause they to whom the promises were made " all died in 
faith : ^' and beside it is the " promised land that they 
are to haye for an inheritance. As, therefore, they died 
without haying receiyed what was promised them, and as 
God's promises are sure unto all whose God he remains to 
be, it follows^ ineyitably, that they will be raised from 
the dead. 

The Sadducees were not ignorant concerning the 
promises of God to their fathers, and so when Jesus call- 
ed their attention to the fact that those promises had not 
been fulfilled, they saw at once that in order to a fullill- 
ment there must be a resurrection. They recognized the 
fact as an unansweraile argument, for " certain of the 
scribes, answering, said. Master, thou hast well said. 
And after that they durst not ask him any question at 
all.'' A more conyincing and conclusiye argument for 
the resurrection could not be produced, for to deny it 
when thus presented was to deny the stability of God's 
word. 

We think no earnest seeker after truth will fail to see 
how it is that God is the God of Abraham, and of Isaac, 
and of Jacob, though they haye been long dead, or in 
what sense all, whose God he is, "liye unto him." 

One thought more. The expression " God is not the 



134 



MA^T 2sOT IM]^rORTAL. 



God of the dead, but of the living'' is incontrovertible ev- 
idence that they whose God he is 7iGt, are dead in that 
sense in which the patriarchs, whose God he is, are said 
to be alive. The reader will please note this point. If, 
therefore, the language proves that Abraham, Isaac and 
Jacob are living and conscious at the present time, it 
must also prove that they whose God he is "ashamed 
to be called '' are dead and unconscious at the present 
time. Thus the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, 
so far as it is thought to be favored by the texts under 
consideration, is demolished by the inexorable logic of 
the very argument adduced to sustain it. Let it go: it 
is a doctrine which will not bear the test of Scripture in- 
restigation. 

To all who name the name of Christ we would say, 
strive to grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord 
and Saviour Jesus Christ, for thus you will be ever 
owned as God's children; and though you "go down 
into the valley of the shadow of death," you need "fear 
no evil," for God will continue to be your God, and 
hence will bring you forth, in fulfillment of his promise, 
to sit down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the ever- 
lasting kingdom of Christ. 

Eest assured that God is still the God of his people, 
*^ though they have been long dead," and lecause he is 
so he will, in his appointed time, give unto them an 
eternal triumph over death. Until the dawn of that 
glad day, let us all both diligently strive and patiently 
wait. 

It is written, " He shall keep the fe^t of his saints :" 
He will be with them in all the places whithersoever they 
go, and will preserve them, so that none shall be lost. He 



REVIEW OF ^^REY. J^. D. GEORGE." 



135 



will not be ^-ashamed to be called their God, for he hath 
prepared for them a city." But what of those whose God 
he is " ashamed to be called ?" " The wicked siiall be 
silent in darkness." Then they will not be forever 
cursing and blaspheming against God and the whole 
host of heaven. No, no, they shall be " sile7it " in the 
" darkness " of the tomb. Wickedness shall cease, and 
evil shall be no more. 0, that all who profess to serve 
God might earnestly and prayerfully consider these 
things, that so they might the more heartily and intel- 
ligently sing praises to the Lord, and declare unto the 
people his doings." 

CHAPTEE VIII. 
Part L 

The Eich Mak ai^d Lazarus. — Luke xvi. 

There are probably no texts in the Bible more con- 
fidently relied on or more frequently quoted by many 
as affording proof of the popular theory concerning 
man's nature and destiny, than are the last thirteen 
yerses in the sixteenth chapter of The Gospel accord- 
ing to St. Luke." As the author whose work we re- 
yiew has considerable to say of Mr. Storrs' exposition, 
being careful, the v/hile, not to furnish his readers with 
any of that expositor's arguments, we will briefly sup- 
ply the omission. Especially do we this because Mr. 
George, without frankly saying so, seems to regard this 
language of our Sayiour in the light of literal history, 
and defends that principle of interpreting it. 

" Those who maintain that it is a literal relation, have 



136 MA^q- KOT IMMORTAL. 

no less difficulty in exjolaining it than their opponents : 
they cannot explain it all literally, and yet they are 
bound to do so to be consistent. Let them make the 
attempt. Lazarus, covered with sores, died and was 
carried into Abraham's iosom. Will they pretend that 
is literal ? 0, no, say they, it was Lazarus' soul ! But 
our Lord says, Lazarus was carried into Abraham's bo- 
som. Our opponents have to say — ^Not so, Lord — it 
was his soul : ' thus, they contradict our Lord to estab- 
lish their own ^traditions.' Let us see whether they 
succeed any better with their real history of the rich 
man. He died. What became of him ? He ^ was bu- 
ried:^ the rich man was buried, remember. What 
next ? ' In \JiadeSj the grave, of course, where he was 
buried; improperly translated] hell he lifted up his 
eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off and 
Lazarus in his bosom,' etc. The rich man did this. 
They say — It was his soul: but our Lord says, it was 
the rich man. Thus again they make void the words 
of Christ to establish their traditions, if our Lord did 
really give a ^literal history.' But for the sake of 
showing the folly of their tradition about the soul we 
will suppose it was Lazarus' and the rich man's souls 
or spirits, disembodied, that are in hades. We now ask 
— Are their disembodied souls or spirits material or 
immaterial ? That is, are they matter, or not matter ? 
We are answered — ' They are immaterial.' If so, they 
have no substance! Can that which has no substance 
be seen or touched ? If not, the ^literal history ' advo- 
cates have an immaterial rich rnan, with immaterial 
eyes, looking afar off and seeing immaterial Lazarus, or 
no-substance Lazarus! Truly, these immaterial souls 
must have sharp eyes to see nothing! and an equally 
sharp understanding to know that it is Lazarus ! But 
that is not all. The immaterial rich man desires that 
immaterial Lazarus should dip his immaterial finger in 
literal water and cool his immaterial tongue I And all 



REVIEW OF ^^EEY. IT. D. GEORGE." 



137 



this is Mifceral history !' We haye not placed the sub- 
ject in this absurd light with any other yiew than 
merely to show the literal history ^ adyocates that they 
are, at least, as much inyolyed in difficulty in explain- 
ing this Scripture as we, who belieye it to be a parable, 
and that it has no reference to man^s state in a future 
life. 

" That it is a parable, the context shows. It is in a 
group of them, yiz., the lost piece of silyer — the lost 
sheep — the prodigal son, and the wasteful or ^unjust 
steward,^ with an admonition against serving mammon, 
or riches. The Pharisees, who were coyetous, heard all 
these things, and they derided him. Our Lord then 
proceeds in his discourse with special reference to the 
change about to take place in the dispensations. He 
says — ^ The law and the prophets were [preached] until 
John ; since that time the Kingdom of God is preached,^ 
etc," — Watch Toiuer, 

We hold the language to be a parable. On no other 
principle of interpretation can it be explained without 
inyolying contradictions and absurdities too palpable to 
be disregarded. But it is insisted by some that eyen 
parables are founded in fact. Let us see if this is true. 

"The trees went forth on a time to anoint a king 
oyer them ; and they said unto the oliye tree, Eeign 
thou oyer us. But the olive tree said unto them, should 
I leaye my fatness, wherey/ith by me they honor God 
and man, and go to be promoted oyer the trees ? And 
the trees said to the fig tree. Come thou, and reign oyer 
us. But the fig tree said unto them, should I forsake 
my sweetness, and my fruit, and go to be promoted oyer 
the trees? Then said the trees unto the yine, Come 
thou, and reign oyer us,'^ etc., etc. — Judges ix. 8-15. 

Trees certainly are not in the habit of meeting to- 
gether to choose and anoint a king oyer them ; and 



138 



we do not tliink any reasonable person Vv^ill take the 
ground that such an occurrence evev really fcook place. 
The account is a parable, and it illustrates some truth. 
Again: 

Son of man, put forth a riddle, and speak a para- 
ble unto the house of Israel; and say, Thus saith the 
Lord God, a great eagle with great wings, long winged, 
full of feathers, which had divers colors, came unto 
Lebanon, and took the highest branch of the cedar : He 
cropped off the top of his young twigs, and carried it 
into a land of traffic; he set it into a city of merchants. 
He look also of the seed of the land, and planted it in 
a fruitful field ; he placed it by great waters, and set it 
as a willow tree. And it grew, and became a spreading 
vine of low stature, whose branches turned toward him. 
. . . There was also another great eagle with great 
wings and many feathers; and, behold, this vine did 
bend her roots toward him, and shot forth her branches 
toward him, that he might water it by the furrows of 
her plantation. It was planted in a good soil by great 
waters, that it might bring forth branches, and that it 
might bear fruit, that it might be a goodly vine.^^ — 
Ezek. xvii. 2-8. 

If this parable is founded in fact, the eagles spoken 
of must have possessed a very much higher degree of 
intelligence than theologians of the present day are wil- 
ling to accord to any of the brute creation. The vine, 
too, which the eagle planted, grew with the view to ac- 
complishing a certain object. None will claim that this 
parable is founded in fact. But our Eev. author says 
the Saviour^s parables are all founded upon facts." He 
then proceeds to show how they are '^founded upon 
facts." ^'1. There are such men as rich men." Yes. 
"2. Eich men sometimes fare sumptuously." Quite 



BEYIEW OF "KEY. IST. D. GEORGE.'^ 139 

true. ^^3. That there are be^gars.'^ Certainly, quite a 
number. "4. That there are dogs." We confess to 
having seen some and heard of others. 5. That there 
is such a thing as death.'^ The arch enemy, the king of 
terrors has reigned too long, and is at the present time 
too alarmingly active to have his existence denied. " 6. 
That there are such beings as angels.'^ The Scriptures 
so inform us. " 7. That there is such a place as Hades, 
a place of departed spirits." The existence of hades we 
aflBrm, but, that it is a place" where "departed spirits*' 
exist in a state of consciousness is a most unjustifiable 
assumption, for the Bible teaches no such thing, but 
just the reverse. "8. That conscious beings are in 
Hades, and some are tormented there." 

This writer sets himself to prove that the parable is 
founded in fact, but when he comes to the main fea- 
tures of the parable he is compelled to assume them. 
That the text teaches the consciousness of any part of 
man while the other part is dead is the very thing to be 
proved, not assumed. There are such beings as " an- 
gels," " rich men," " beggars," and " dogs," and there is 
such a state as hades, consequently, it is argued, there 
must be consciousness in hades. Why, then, not add 
also that the inhabitants of heaven and hell must con- 
verse with each other, as Abraham and the rich man 
are held to have literally done ? If consciousness is in- 
dicated so is the conversation between the dwellers in 
the two places. There are such objects as trees ; there 
is such a thing as office of king; and there are such af- 
fairs as conventions for the purpose of choosing rulers, 
but who will claim that consequently the parable of the 
trees is founded upon fact ? According to such a no- 



140 



MA^^q- IsOT IMMORTAL. 



tion any parable is founded in facfc unless the figures 
used are something that never were heard of and haye 
no existence. A brilliant conception ! Profound 
thought ! The figures used in a parable are facts, of 
course, as to their existence, but the parable is not so. 

A parable is an allegorical representation of some- 
thing, the thing represented being entirely different 
from what is chosen to represent it. Ilence the "rich 
man'^ cannot represent a literal rich man, but some- 
thing else. ]Si either can the " beggar represent a lit- 
eral beggar. Bishop Lowth remarks: 

"Parable is that kind of allegory which consists in 
a continued narration of fictitious or accommodated 
events, applied to the illustration of some important 
truth,^' 

No well instructed Bible student will go to a parable 
or metaphor to prove a doctrine. Dr. Adam Clarke re- 
marks on Matt. V. 26 : 

" Let it be remembered, that by the general consent 
of all, (except the basely interested) no metaphor is 
ever to be produced in proof of a doctrine. In the 
things that concern our eternal salvation, we need the 
most pointed and express evidence on which to estab- 
lish the faith of our souls.'^ 

So we think. Whitby writes : 

" That this is only a parable, and not a real history 
of what was actually done, is evident: 1. Because we 
find this very parable in the Gemara Babylonicum, 
whence it is cited by Mr. Sheringham, in the preface to 
his Joma. 2. From the circumstances of it, viz., the 
rich man lifting up his eyes in hell, and seeing Lazarus 
in Abraham's bosom, his discourse with Abraham, his 
complaint of being tormented with flames, and his de- 



EEYIEW OF "HEY. K. D. GEORGE/' 



141 



sire that Lazarus might be sent to cool his tongue ; and 
if all this be confessedly parable, why should the rest, 
which is the yery parable in the Gemara, be accounted, 
history ? '' 

Says Lightfoot : 

" Whoever believes this not to be a parable, but a 
true story, let him believe also those little friars, whose 
trade it is to show the monuments at Jerusalem to pil- 
grims, and point exactly to the place where the house 
of the ' rich glutton ' stood. Most accurate keepers of 
antiquity indeed ! who, after so niany hundred years, 
such overthrows of Jerusalem, such devastations and 
changes, can make out of the rubbish the place of so 
private a house, and such a one too, that never had any 
beiug, but merely in parable. And that it was a para- 
ble, not only the consent of all expositors may assure 
US, but the thing itself speai^s it. The main scope and 
design of it seems this — to hint the destruction of the 
unbelieving Jews, who, though they had Moses and the 
prophets, did not believe them — nay, would not believe, 
though one (even Jesus) arose from the dead. For that 
conclusion of the parable abundantly evidenceth what 
it aimed af — Hel, mid Talm. Exerc. in Lulce xvi. 19. 

Wakefield says : 

" It must be remembered, that hades nowhere means 
hell — gehenna — in any author whatsoever, sacred or 
profane; and also that our Lord is giving his hearers a 
parable, (Matt. xiii. 34) and not a piece of real history. 
To them who regard the narration as a reality, it must 
stand as an unanswerable argument for the purgatory 
of the papists. The universal meaning of hades is the 
state of death.'' 

Let us see how they manage who accept the lan- 
guage as an account of what actually took place. "And 
it came to pass, that the ^ beggar died, and was carried 



MAK KOT IMMORTAL. 



by the angels into Abraham's bosom/^ Will they ad- 
mit that the beggar himself was carried? No, it is in- 
sisted that it was his soul that was carried. Very welV 
we will so read it. And it came to pass, that the beggar 
died, and his soul was carried by the angels into Abra- 
ham's bosom : the rich man also died, and his soul was 
buried.'^ Stop ! stop ! is the cry, it was the rich man 
that was buried: his soul went to hell. Indeed ! this is 
a strange way of reading an account of what actually 
happened. That must be a faulty theory truly which 
requires the application of opposite and conflicting rules 
of exposition in a single text. 

That the parable was designed to illustrate some 
great truth there can be no question ; and the circum- 
stances connected with the ministrations of Jesus, espe- 
cially those attending the giving of the parable, plainly 
enough, we think, indicate what that truth is. We be- 
lieve the parable affords a succinct account of the then 
past, present and future condition of both Jews and 
Gentiles. This view is entertained by many who deny 
inherent immortality, and by some who believe that 
doctrine, but in adopting the view they do not, as the 
writer whom we review falsely asserts, " follow in the 
steps" of " Universalists," for it was held and published 
long before Universalism, 

Theophylact says: 

" But this parable can also be explained in the way 
of allegory ; so that we may say, that by the rich man 
is signified the Jevfish people ; for they were formerly 
rich, abounding in all divine knowledge, wisdom, and 
instruction, which are more excellent than gold or pre- 
cious stones. And they were arrayed in purple and fine 



REVIEAV OF ^^liEV. D. GEORGE." 143 

linen, as they possessed a kingdom and a priesthood, 
and were themselves a royal priesthood to God. The 
purple denoted the kingdom^ and the fine linen their 
priesthood; for the Levites were clothed in sacerdotal 
yestments of fine linen, and they fared sumptuously, 
and lived splendidly, every day. Daily did they ofi*er 
the morning and the evening sacrifice, which they also 
called the continual sacrifice. But Lazarus was the 
Gentile people, poor in divine grace and wisdom, and 
lying before the gate ; for it was not permitted to the 
Gentiles to enter the house itself, because they were 
considered a pollution. Thus, in the Acts of the Apos- 
tles, we read that it was alleged against Paul, that he 
had introduced Gentiles into the temple, and made that 
holy place common or unclean. Moreover, those peo- 
ple were full of fetid sores of sin, on which the impu- 
dent dogs, or devils, fed, who delight themselves in our 
sores. The Gentiles likewise desired even the crumbs 
which fell from the table of the rich ; for they were 
wholly destitute of that bread which strengthens the 
heart of man, and wanted even the smallest morsel of 
food; BO that the Canaanite woman, (Matt. xv. 27,) 
when she was a heathen, desired to be fed with the 
crumbs. In short, the Hebrew people were dead unto 
God, and their bones, which could not be moved to do 
good, were perished. Lazarus also (I mean the Gentile 
people), was dead in sin, and the envious Jews, who 
were dead in sins, did actually burn in a flame of jeal- 
ousy, as saith the Apostle, on account of the Gentiles 
being received into the faith, and because that those 
who tad before been a poor and despised Gentile race, 
who were now in the bosom of Abraham, the father of 
nations, and justly, indeed, were they thus received. 
For it was while Abraham was yet a Gentile, that he 
believed God, and turned from the worship of idols to 
the knowledge of God. Therefore, it was proper that 
they who were partakers of this conversion and faith, 



iix^ KOT im:\ioetal. 



should rest in his bosom, sharing the same final lot, the 
same habitation, and the same blessedness. And the 
Jewish people longed for one drop of the former legal 
sprinklings and purifications, to refresh their tongue, 
that they might confidently say to us, that the law was 
still eflacacious and availing. But it was not: for the 
law was only until John. And the Psalmist says, sac- 
rifice and oblations thou wouldst not," 

Dr. Gill, who, like Theophylact, makes a double ap- 
plication of it, says of the expression, ^'the rich mari 
died : 

"It may also be understood of the political and ec- 
clesiastical death of the Jewish people, which lay in the 
destruction of the city of Jerusalem, and of the tem- 
ple, and in the abolition of the temple worship, and of 
the whole ceremonial law : a Loammi was written upon 
their church state, and the covenant between God and 
them was broken ; the Gospel was removed from them, 
which w^as as death, as the return of it, and their call by 
it, svill be as life from the dead ; as well as their place 
and nation, their civil power and authority were taken 
away from them by the Eomans, and a death of afl9.ic- 
tions, by captivity and calamities of every kind has 
attended them ever since." 

Of the expressions, lielV^ — "in torments," the 
same writer says : 

"This may regard the vengeance of God on the 
Jews, at the destruction of Jerusalem, when a fire was 
kindled against their land, and burned to the lowest 
hell, and consumed the earth with her increase, and set 
on fire the foundations of the mountains ; and the 
whole land became brimstone, salt, and burning; and 
they were rooted out of it in anger, wrath, and great 
indignation — see Dent. xxix. 23, 27, 28; xxxii. 22 — or 
rather the dreadful calamities which came upon them 



REVIEW OF "REV. JST. D. GEORGE.'^ 145 



in the time of Adrian, at Either; when their false Mes- 
siah, Bar Cochab, was taken and slain, and such multi- 
tudes of them were destroyed, in the most miserable 
manner, when that people, who before had their eyes 
darkened, and a spirit of slumber and stupidity fallen 
upon them, in those calamities began to be under some 
conviction.'^ 

We would also commend to the careful perusal of all 
the remarks, on this subject, of James Bate, M. A., Eec- 
tor of Deptford. He writes : 

"We will suppose, then, the rich man who fared so 
sumptuously, to be the Jew, so amply enriched with the 
heavenly treasure of divine revelation. The poor beg- 
gar who lay at his gate, in so miserable a plight, was the 
poor Gentile, now reduced to the last degree of want, 
in regard to religious knov/ledge. The crumbs which 
fell from the rich man's table, and which the beggar 
was so desirous of picking up, were such fragments of 
patriarchal and Jev/ish traditions, as their travelling 
philosophers were able to pick up with their utmost 
care and 'diligence. And those philosophers were also 
the dogs that licked the sores of heathenism, and en- 
deavored to supply the wants of divine revelation, by 
such schemes and hypotheses, concerning the nature of 
the gods, and the obligation of moral duties, as (due al- 
lowance for their ignorance and frailties) did no small 
honor to human nature, and yet thereby plainly showed, 
how little a way unaided reason could go, without some 
supernatural help, as one of the wisest of them frankly 
confessed. About one and the same time, the beggar 
dies, and is carried by the angels {i. e., God's spiritual 
messengers to mankind) into Abraham's bosom ; that 
is, he is engrafted into the church of God. And the 
rich man also dies and is buried. He dies what we call 
a political death. His dispensation ceases. He is re- 
jected from being any longer the peculiar son of God. 



146 



MA:^' KOT I3IM0KTAL. 



The people whom he parabolically represents, are mis* 
erably destroyed by the Eomans, and the wretched re- 
mains of them;, driven into exile over the face of the 
earth, were vagabonds, with a kind of a mark set upon 
them, like Cain, their prototype, for a like crime ; and 
which mark may perhaps be their adherence to the law. 
u'herebv it came amazingly to pass, that these people, 
though dispersed, yet still dwell alone and separate, not 
reckoned among the nations, as Balaam foretold. 

" The rich man being reduced to this state of mis- 
ery, complains bitterly of his hard fate, but is told bj 
Abraham, that he slipped his opportunity, while Laza- 
rus laid hold on his, and now receives the comfort of it. 
The Jew complains of the want of more evidence, to 
convince his countrymen, the five brethren, and would 
fain have Lazarus sent from the dead to convert them. 
But Abraham tells him, that if their own scripture can- 
not convince them of their error, neither would they be 
persuaded, though one rose from the dead. And exact- 
ly so it proved in the event. For this parable was de- 
livered toward the end of the third year of our Lord's 
ministry ; and in the fourth, or following year of it, the 
Vfords put into the mouth of Abraham, as the conclu- 
sion of the parable, are most literally verified, by our 
Lord raising another Lazarus from the dead. And we 
may presume, that the beggar had the fictitious name 
of Lazarus given him in the parable, not without some 
reason, since the supposed request of the rich man waa 
fully answered, by our Lord raising another, and a real 
Lazarus, from the dead. But what was the conse- 
quence ? Did this notorious miracle convince the rich 
man^s brethren ? Xo, truly. His visit to them from 
the dead vras so far from convincing them, that they ac- 
tually consulted together, that they might put Lazarus 
also to death; because that, by reason of him, many of 
the Jews went away and believed on Jesus.'^ 

The reader will by this time hardly have failed to 



REVIEW OF "EEY. IST. D. GEORGE." 147 

conclude with us that the Saviour gives^ by the parable, 
a condensed history of the Jews and Gentiles — Lazarus 
representing the Gentiles, and the rich man the Jews. 
Keeping this explication of the parable in mind, the 
reader will please turn, for an explanation of the tor- 
ment, spoken of, to D'eut. xxyiii., where God promises 
the Jews {the rich man) certain great blessings, upon 
condition, as He announces, "that thou hearken unto 
the commandment of the Lord thy God, which I com- 
mand thee this day, to observe and to do them ; " and 
where He also denounces against them certain fearful 
judgments in case of persistent disobedience and rebel- 
lion. What God then spake has been and is being ful- 
filled to the letter. 

The Jews {the rich man) have been suffering those 
torments for the last eighteen hundred years. When 
they rejected Christ they died to the political and eccle- 
siastical privileges which they had so long enjoyed, and 
became outcasts ; while the Gentiles, who, as we have 
seen, were dependent upon the Jews for religious bene- 
fits, died to their condition, and were admitted to all the 
privileges of the Abrahamic covenant, being, through- 
out this dispensation, instruments in the prosecution of 
the work of selecting from among the nations a people 
unto God's name. Christ gave to the apostles the com- 
mission to "go into all the world and preach the gospel 
to every creature." Thus commissioned, they com- 
menced the work by which very many Gentiles have 
been brought into the Abrahamic covenant, as the word 
of God, by Paul, declares : " Know ye therefore, that 
they which are of faith, the same are the children of 
Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing that God 



148 



MAK l^OT UmO'RTA.L. 



would justify the heathen (the Gentiles, the beggar), 
"through faith, preached before the gospel unto Abra- 
ham, saying. In thee shall all nations be blessed. So 
then they which be of faith are blessed with faithful 
Abraham/^ The Jews, by their rejection of Christ, sev- 
ered their covenant relation to God, while so many of 
the Gentiles as have accepted him have established a 
covenant relation to God. 

Thus it is seen that the conditions of the two, Jews 
and Gentiles, have been more than reversed, a fact 
which, we conceive, the parable was given to illustrate. 
Between these conditions there is a " gulph fixed,^^ and 
neither Jew nor Gentile can, as such, cross it. The 
Jew cannot, strictly as such, come into the full cove- 
nant relation, because acceptance of Christ is an inexo- 
rable condition ; and no Gentile can become a Jew, and 
still maintain the covenant relation, because he must 
first deny Christ. 

We might multiply proof that our exposition is the 
true design of the parable, and that therefore the expo- 
sition which makes it teach consciousness between 
death and resurrection is an unreasonable and a wrong 
one, but we forbear, feeling assured that enough has 
been said to satisfy any sincere seeker after truth. 

Part IL 

" And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall 
awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlast- 
ing contempt." — Dan. xii. 2. 

As no one will claim that this passage affords any 
intimation that man is immortal, we are not under the 
necessity of noticing it; but its use by many, Mr. 



REVIEW OF "KEY. I^f. D. GEORGE." 149 

George among the number, as a proof text in support 
of a universal resurrection, and, consequently, if they 
are at all consistent, in support of Universalism, for Je- 
sus plainly and positively declared, " they which shall 
be accounted worthy to obtain that world, and the res- 
urrection from the dead," cannot "die anymore: for 
they are equal unto the angels ; and are the cliildren of 
God, leing the cliildren of the resurrection^ — Luke xx. 
35, 36 ; and Paul declares that the dead are raised in 
power, glory, and incorruption, we give it some atten- 
tion in order to correct some of those misapprehensions 
through which it is subjected to such misuse. 

"And many of tliem that sleep." What are the 
"them" who sleep ? There can be but' one reply: all 
will agree that the promise has reference to people, men, 
and others. But Mr. George simply expresses the opin^ 
ion of a very large class of theorists when he affirms 
that what dies is not the man, that men do not die. 
The reader will pardon our repeated allusion to this 
point, for some of the inconsistencies of the position 
stare us in the face at almost every turn. " Corpses," 
says he, " are only the remains of men." It will be per- 
ceived that this theory denies that there are any men 
sleeping "in the dust of the earth," and so none "shall 
awake." Is not this a virtual denial that the text teach- 
es any resurrection whatever? How unfortunate for 
such a position is it that Daniel did not receive latter- 
day theological instruction. The prophet was simply 
the mouthpiece of Jehovah, who here emphatically de- 
clares that " many of them that sleep in the dust of the 
earth shall awake." We believe the word of promise 
and rejoice in it. May all who profess to love the Lord 



150 



MAISr Is^OT IjIMOETAL. 



believe it^ and patiently await tlie coming of the glo- 
rious day ; and if, while waiting, death triumphs oyer 
us and numbers us with the sleepers " in the dust/^ may 
we go down rejoicing in the blessed hope of awaking 
when Christ shall come with his holy angels. 

Many of them who think they find universal resur- 
rection in the text, labor to show, as they are, of course, 
under the necessity of doing, that the wwd many is 
there used in comprehension of the whole. The term 
may sometimes be properly understood as comprehend- 
ing all, but Dan. xii. 2 is most assuredly not such an in- 
stance, for the preposition o/, immediately following it, 
is necessarily restrictive, limiting the reference to a class. 
Did the next sentence but one preceding this commence 
thus : ^^many who think they Cnd,^^ etc., we might, by a 
somewhat forced construction, be understood as refer- 
ring to all that class ; but as it reads, " many of them 
who think they find," etc., every reader will understand 
at once that we except some. Many of, in the text, can- 
not possibly mean the whole : some are manifestly ex- 
cepted. 

Professors Bush, Whiting, and other eminent He- 
braists think that the words ^^some'^ and "some" are 
not a correct rendering of the original. The word is a 
demonstrative pronoun, defined by Gesenius " thece." 
Thus the corrected text would read, "these" (who 
aw^ake) to everlasting life, but those (who awake not) 
to shame and everlasting contempt," or abhorrence. 
Aben Ezra says : 

" Those who awake shall be (appointed) to everlast- 
ing life, and those who awake not shall be (doomed) to 
shame and everlasting contempt." 



REVIEW OF "KEY. i^-. D. GEORGE." 151 

Thomas Read, Bible vs. Traditio^t, remarks : 

^' Ailleli — iveaiUelij rendered "some" and "some" iu 
English version, are in nearly every other place ren- 
dered ^ these ' and ' tliose! There is no representative of 
the word ' some ^ in the Hebrew,'^ 

Eabbi Saadias Gaon, who lived in the tenth century, 
in writing on this text, Dan. xii. 2, says : 

"This is the resurrection of the dead of Israel whosQ 
lot is to eternal life ; iut those loho do not aivahe, they 
are the destroyed of the Lord,'^ 

They who hold to the universal resurrection theory 
will do well to remember these remarks of Eabbi Gaon 
in connection with Paul's words as recorded in Acta 
xxiv. 15, which, it is said, are equal unto an avowal that 
the apostle believed in a resurrection of all the dead, he 
having said he was a Pharisee^ and it being claimed that 
the Pharisees held to a universal resurrection. This 
learned Jew affirms the prophecy of Daniel is that some 
shall awake, and some shall not. It cannot be supposed 
that he could thus interpret the language had he not 
known that his people of old did not believe all would 
" awake," be raised from the dead. He could only so 
interpret in the belief that they held that some, at least, 
would not live again, a fact which, as it precludes the 
idea that the Pharisees "allowed" Paul's "hope," if^ as 
is claimed, that hope embraced a resurrection of all ir- 
respective of character, precludes also the idea that the 
"hope" did embrace a universal resurrection. 

A. M. Osbon, D. D., of the M. E. church, published 
some fifteen years ago, a work entitled "Da^tiel Veri- 
fied i^q- History akd Chroi^ology." The introduc- 
tion of the book was written, we believe, by Dr. Whe- 



153 



MA^s 2sOT i:yijIOKTAL. 



don^ long editor of the Methodist Quaeterly Ee^ 
TiEAY. The author of the work writes as follows^ on 
Dan. xii. 2 : 

^^Let lis recur for a moment to the structure of the 
passage. This can be best shown by paraphrasing the 
verse. ' 3Iany oi them that sleep in the dust of the 
earth shall awake^ some (the many who awake shall 
awake) to everlasting life^ and some (those who do not 
awake shall sleep in) shame and everlasting contempt. 
Only the 'onany^ who shall be found ^written in the 
book ^ shall ' awake.' .... It will not help the case at 
all to quote Eomans v. 19, for the passage is not a par- 
allel. The ' many ^ of the apostle is a very different 
thing from the 'many^ of the prophet. The former 
uses the word to denote all persons of whom he is 
speaking, 'many were made sinners;' the latter to des- 
ignate a portion of a large number, ^many o/them that 
sleep in the dust.' It is perfectly apparent, then, that 
the particle of severalty fixes the antithesis between the 
states of those who aicahe, and those who do not aivake, 
and not between the states of those who awake." 

It is true the writer of the above applies Dan. xii. 2 
to other than a literal resurrection of the dead, but his 
argument in showing that the awaking will not be a 
universal one is no less forcible. Certain it is that the 
passage implies that some of the dead will not be awak- 
ened. ^^Man that is in honor, and understandeth not, 
is like the beasts that perish. He shall go to the gen- 
eration of his fathers ; they shall never see lightJ^ 



REVIEW OF ^-REV. i^". D. GEORGE." 153 

CHAPTER IXe 

Im77iortal — " Imjiioiiality " — Eternal LifeP 
Iiq" our interpretations of Scripture, words and 
phrases should be accorded their literal and obvious 
meaning unless there is a manifest necessity for doing 
otherwise in order to sound sense and harmony with 
the general tenor of Scripture teaching on any given 
subject. Eichard "Watson writes : 

The terms of the record are to be taken in their 
plain and commonly received sense ; ligures of speech 
are to be interpreted with reference to the local pe- 
culiarities of the country in which the agents who 
wrote the record resided; idioms are to be understood 
according to the genius of the language employed ; if 
any allegorical or mystical discourses occur, the key 
to them must be sought in the book itself, and not in 
our own fancies/^ 

Jeremy Taylor remarks : 

In all interpretations of Scripture, the literal sense 
is to be presumed and chosen unless there is evident 
cause to the contrary." 

Hooker says : 

" I hold it for a most infallible rule in expositions 
of sacred Scripture, that when a literal construction will 
stand, the farthest from the letter is commonly the 
worst. There is nothing more dangerous and delusive 
than that act which changes the meaning of words, as 
alchemy doth or would the substance of metals ; making 
of any thing what it listeth, and bringing in the end all 
truth to nothing." 

Supporters of the theory of inherent immortality 
long since chose to violate these reasonable and obvious 



154 



MAK xoT im:mortal. 



principles of exegesis in their interpretation of terms 
which express the penalty of transgression^ insisting 
upon attaching to certain words a meaning differing 
yery widely from what is clearly imported, a meaniug 
almost if not directly the opposite of what is held to at- 
tach to the same terms whenever they are met with in 
any other book than the Bible, and that, too, when the 
circumstances attendant upon the Scripture use of 
them necessitate, in order to justice, the plainest and 
most direct forms of expression. 

So-called, orthodox theologists have, we say, long 
since taken the liberty of affirming that death, the di- 
yinely announced penalty of sin, means life in a state 
of torment, while the life promised as a reward to the 
obedient, means lia])])ine8s. That this is most bold 
and unjustifiable assumption, at war with both reason 
and the simplest principle of justice, every unprejudiced 
reader of the Bible must see. Dr. John Locke but ex- 
presses what ought to be a uniyersal sentiment, when he 
says : " It seems a strange way of understanding a law 
which requires the plainest and most direct words, that 
by ^death^ should be meant eternal life in misery." 
Most of that class of interpreters stop here ; but a few, 
more daring and reckless, go farther. 

Having written profusely, and earnestly, and oft- 
times bitterly in his efforts to proye that all men are 
immortal, undying, Mr. George comes to the text which 
declares that God " only hath immortality ; and find- 
ing no less unreasonable a way to "dispose of^^ so 
plain a "thus saith the Lord,'^ he makes the term "im- 
mortality " mean eternal happiness. Lest ic should be 
said that he does not claim that all souls are immortal, 



TvEYIEW OF "REV. D. GEORGE." 155 

we quote the following written, seemingly, before lie 
had found it necessary to attempt to strip the term im- 
mortality of its true meaning. He says: "But did 
ever any one contend that immortality was the only 
attribute of the soul?" Thus we see he has been 
claiming that soul-entities have certain attributes, one 
of which, is immortality. 

If immortality is an " attribute of the soul/' every 
soul must be immortal. '^But," says he, in another 
part of his work, " we have found no Scriptures which 
teach that all men are immortal." True enough : he 
surely has not ; nor will he ever find any. The Bible 
does not teach that men are immortal, but just the 
reverse, and hence all are urged to '^seeh for^' immor- 
tality. Although he uses soul and spirit interchangea- 
t)ly to express the supposed undying part of man, he 
says "man has a spirit within him which is unending 
in its nature, so that it cannot wear out and die." And 
he adds : 

" But that poetry is not fact, which, by some unac- 
countable means, has found its way into the revised edi- 
tion of the Methodist Hymn Book, which says, ^Our 
souls are his immortal breath.^ " 

As we cannot do him the injustice to even suppose 
him so ignorant of the facts in the case as not to know 
that the author of the hymn used the term " immortal " 
in the sense of undying, and not in the sense of " hap- 
py," we must understand him as, in this one instance, 
affirming moi'tality of man. Then, too, he can now lay 
no claim to Gen. ii. 7, as favoring the immortal-soul 
idea. Dr. Adam Clarke says of the words, God formed 
man of the dust : 



156 



MAK KOT IMMORTAL. 



"In the most distinct manner God shovvS us that 
man is a compound being, having a body and a soul, 
distinctly and separately created ; the body out of the 
dust of the earth, the soul immediately breathed from 
God himself. ... Of the soul it is said, God Ireathed 
into Ids nostrils the Ireath of lifer 

How could the Dr. haye more plainly expressed the 
sentiment, "Our souls are his immortal breath?^' 
Judging from the exceeding great importance attribu- 
ted to the fact that those who hold what we believe to 
be the Bible view of man^s nature and destiny differ in 
some particulars, a reader of "Annihilationism not of the 
Bible/^ might suppose that its author never held an 
opinion differing from any leading Methodist mind ; but 
we have elsewhere shown him widely at variance with 
prominent Methodists, and we now find him. character- 
izing a sentiment expressed by Dr. Clarke and the au- 
thor of the hymn referred to, as well as by all who sing 
the hymn believingly, as "poetry " but "not fact.'^ He 
states what is true^ but in doing it he inflicts a terrible 
blow upon his own theory. He yields the very text 
which some learned and thinking men of the popular 
faith have been compelled to conclude is about the 
only one which teaches their doctrine. It is said of 
the terms " immortal " and " immortality : 

" They are generally considered, in the theological 
world, to mean, eternal conscious leing ; whereas the 
Scriptural im2)ort of the term is, eternal happiness^ be- 
ing synonymous with the phrase ^eternal life.^^^ 

Yes, the terms "immortal" and " immortality " are 
"generally considered,'^ theologically, to mean, primari- 
ly, "eternal conscious being;'' not subject to death; 
eternal life; and "mortal" and "mortality" are, in 



REVIEAY OF " llET. X. D. GEORGE." 



157 



consequence, held to mean, iemporary conscious Jjeing ; 
subjc'Ct to loss of life. If, therefore, immortality means 
eternal happiness/' then, by parity of reasoning, mor- 
tal^ and mortality mast mean te'nrporcirij liappiness. Ap- 
ply such a principle of interpretation to the following, 
relating to God : " ISTow unto the King eternal, eternally 
happy (immortal) invisible, the only wise God,^^ etc. — 
1 Tim. i. 17. How absurd is the supposition that im- 
mortal, applied to God, means, eternally liappy. And 
again : " Which in his times he shall show, who is the 
blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and 
Lord of lords; who only hath eternal liappiness (im- 
mortality)." — 1 Tim. yi. 15, 16. Comment is needless. 

Eead, too, in the light of such an interpretation, the 
language of Paul, where he proves the resurrection of 
the dead, and an analogous change in the living, and 
see what worse than absurdity is produced. The apostle 
thus WTites : 

"The dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we 
shall be changed. For this corruptible shall put on in- 
corruption, and this mortal must put on immortality. 
So when this corruptible shall have put on incorrup- 
tion, and this mortal shall have put on immortality, 
then shall be brought to pass the saying that is writ- 
ten. Death is swallowed up in victory." — 1 Cor. xv. 52- 
54. 

The expressions, " dead shall be raised incorrupti- 
ble," and " this corruption must put on incorruption," 
refer to the change which is to take place in the dead 
who will be raised to life; and the expressions, "we 
shall be changed," and, "this mortal must put on im- 
mortality," refer to the change in the condition of be- 
lievers who shall be then living. Incorriiption and 



158 



ma:n" not immortal. 



immortality J therefore, rei)reseDt one and the same con- 
dition, while their opposites also represent like condi- 
tion. So if immortality/^ inverse 53, means eternal 
TiapjjinesSy^' mQorYxx^iion,^^ in the same yerse, must also 
mean eternal liayjpiness ; while "mortaP^ and cor- 
ruptible^^ must m^^'^y temporary liappiness. Thus we 
not only have Paul representing the sorrowing, and 
struggling, and suffering pilgrims of the last day as be- 
ing changed from a condition which they could not be 
said to be in, but we have him also representing the* 
dead in their graves as coming out of a condition of 
temporary happiness to one of eternal happiness. None 
will contend that there is happiness, or even conscious- 
ness in the grave. " There is no work, nor device, nor 
knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave,'^ is the language 
of inspiration. 

But let us see whether the scriptural meaning of the 
term life is happiness ; and whether the phrase " eter- 
nal life^^ means, "eternal happiness." Substitute "hap- 
piness" for "life," in the following passages: "That 
he would grant unto us, that we, being delivered out of 
the hand of our enemies, might serve him without fear, 
in holiness and righteousness before him, all the days 
of our liappine^s (life)."— Luke i. 74, 75. "In him was 
happiness (life) ; and the happiness (life) was the light 
of men." — John i. 4. "I am the bread of happiness 
(life)."_John vi. 35. 

How transcandently absurd is it to suppose that 
" life " in the foregoing, and many other texts, means 
happiness. It will be objected that life does not mean 
happiness in that class of texts. A convenient style of 
explaining, truly ! Life always means happiness when 



KEYIEW OF ^^REV. K. D. GEOKGE.'' 139 

ii. suits a darling theory to have it so, no matter how 
much it conflicts with or contradicts other portions of 
Scripture ! 

If Jesus had meant to conyey the idea of "happy" 
or "happiness/^ in any of the texts where "life^^ and 

eternal life" occur, he could just as well have used 
malcariosj or maJcarismos, -as to have used zoee, which 
does not mean happy, or happiness at all, but life. 
He used the former term, malcarios, more than a score 
of times to express "happy," or "blessed." "We may 
rest assured Jesus did not use terms which do not ex- 
presa the idea which he wished to convey. 

"Search the Scriptures; for in them ye think ye 
have eternal liappiness (life). . . And ye will not 
come to me, that ye might have liapinness (life)." — John 
V. 39, 40. "But is now made manifest by the appearing 
of our Saviour Jesus Christ, who hath abolished death, 
and hath brought liappiness and eternal liappiness (life 
and immortality) to light through the Gospel." — 2 Tim. 
L 10. To make "life," in this text, mean "happiness/* 
is, besides making nonsense of it, to affirm Universal- 
ism; for if " life" means happiness, the antithetic term, 
"death," must mean misery; and how can misery be 
abolished, except by conferring universal happiness ? 

We need not quote more texts, enough having been 
done in that direction to satisfy any reasonable mind 
that the Scripture import of "life" is not "happiness," 
nor that of " immortality," " eternal happiness." While 
Christ promised eternal life more than forty times, he 
not once promised eternal liappiness, a fact in view of 
which it is worse, far worse than folly to assert that he 
meant to promise happiness. Of course, life and cUatli 



IGO 



MA^^ XOT IMMORTAL. 



are both sometimes used figuratively, but m all such 
cases the context renders it easy to determine the fact. 

The expressions, life/^ having reference to future 
life, "eternal life/^ etc., are viany times used in the Xew 
Testament, but we meet with nothing which may be 
construed into a caution that they are to be understood 
in any sense other than that of living existence, a con- 
scious being which will not be subject to death. The 
terms, therefore, mean just what they naturally import. 
Happiness is inseparably connected with the life which 
Christ bestows, but it is life that is "the gift of God 
the unspeakable joy, glory, and "pleasures forever- 
more^^ are consequent upon the bestowal of life. Christ 
came to give men life, so that they may have the joy 
and the glory. Literal life, a conscious existence that 
will not be subject to interruption by death is the 
promise of the gosjjel ; it is the gosjjel lioin. It is said, 
assuming that 1 Tim. vi. 15, 16, refers to Christ: 

"The man Christ Jesus is the only man who has 
not been affected by the fall, and who, consequently, 
did not suffer the loss of immortality by 

In other words (immortality being held to mean 
eternal happiness) Christ possessed eternal happiness, 
just such happiness (life) as is promised to the saints, 
when he was tempted, hungered, spit upon, buffeted, 
scourged, and finally crucified. If a man may possess 
eternal happiness and still be subject to such anguish 
as Christ is represented as suffering in Gethsemane, 
when, it is recorded, "being in agony he prayed more 
earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of 
blood," or when he cried, " My God, my God, why hast 



REVIEW OF "REY. IS". D. GEORGE." 161 

thou forsaken me/' how may we Icnoiu that its possessor 
will ever be secure against suffering ? We had supposed 
that we were^ by what we had already seen, prepared for 
any thing in the way of absurdity, but we had eyi- 
dently miscalculated the ability of some in that direc- 
tion. In the first place the language cannot refer to 
Christ, for, there being a God and Father oyer all, Christ 
cannot be said to only haye immortality (eternal happi- 
ness, as is claimed). Beside, it- is said, "whom no man 
hath seen ; and we know that Christ was seen eyen 
in his incorruptible state. Paul would hardly write 
thus of one whom, he affirms, he had himself seen. 

The fact is, eternal happiness is not and cannot be 
subject to any sorrow, mxuch less such agony as the 
man Christ Jesus" suffered at yarious times, and hence 
it is pitiable to talk about "the man Christ Jesus" 
possessing " eternal happiness " before his death, and 
resurrection from the dead; quite as pitiable is it as to 
talk of his being immortal, in the true sense of the term, 
while he was yet subject to death. We are led to think 
that the depths of folly into which men may sink in 
their efforts to sustain a false theory are immeasurable. 

"None of the ungodly will inherit immortality in 
the sense of the term as employed in the Scriptures . . . 
None but the saints are heirs to Bible immortality." 

Thus we see our author plainly admits that the un- 
godly will not inherit immortality ; that no man is im- 
mortal now, the " saints " being only " heirs " to im- 
mortality. We haye dwelt thus at length on this sub- 
ject because he has staked all upon the assumption that 
the Scripture meaning of eternal life and immortality is 
" eternal happiness ; " and we haye, as the reader has 



1C3 



IIA^ ITOT IMMORTAL. 



seen, shown that the interpretation is far more than un- 
true; it robs certain Scripture language of its force and 
renders it senseless and ridiculous. So far from beino; 
true^ it cannot eyen lay a reasonable claim to truth. 

The wages of sin is death ; but the gift of God is eter- 
nal life," literal life that will endure forever. Life is the 
gift, but the gift, when bestowed, will be accompanied 
by glory and delights far too great to enter " into the 
heart of man to conceive." 

Although, in our examination of the texts that are 
by many relied on with some degree of confidence to 
sustain the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, we 
have found some things which, superficially considered, 
are somewhat calculated to confirm the prejudices of 
those who go to the Bible with not only a strong con- 
viction that inherent or natural immortality is true, but 
with a determination also to make some part of the word 
of God teach it, we have found nothing which, interpre- 
ted in the light of all well-understood Scripture lan- 
guage, could possibly create such a belief. It should pot 
be forgotten that not a few theologists and Bible stu- 
dents who hold to the doctrine frankly admit that it is 
not found in the Bible. 

Watson, the great Methodist, says : 

"Some suppose consciousness is an essential attri- 
bute of spirit; and the soul is naturally immortal ; the 
former of which cannot be proved, w^hile the latter is 
contradicted by the Bible, which makes our immortal- 
ity a gift dependent on the will of the giver." 

Watson is strictly correct in saying that inherent 
immortality is " contradicted by the Bible, which makes 
our immortality a gift dependent on the will of tht- giv- 



KEYIEW OF ^^REV. D. GEORGE.'^ 1G3 

er." God has nowhere said he would give immortality 
to any but the saints; but it is said, "all the wicked 
w^ill he destroy.'^ Again, in attempting to prove that 
the presence of an immaterial soul with the body is the 
source of animal life, Mr. Watson says: 

" It is granted that, on the premises laid down, not 
only must an immaterial principle be allowed to man, 
but to all animals possessed of yolition ; and few, per- 
haps none, are found without this property ... It does 
not, however, follow that they are immortal because 
they are immaterial. The truth is, that God only hath 
independent immortality, because he only is self-exist- 
ent, and neither human nor brute souls are of necessity 
immortal.'^ 

Darby, in his Hopes of the Clmrcli, says : 

"We would express our conviction that the idea of 
the immortality of the soul has no source in the gospel ; 
that it comes, on the contrary, from the Platonists.'^ 

These are testimonies of learned men, and as they 
Relieved the doctrine, we may be sure they would have 
found it in the Bible were it there. A simple acknowl- 
edgment of the fact that the Bible does not teach it, 
would have been very significant ; but they go farther, 
one of them affirming that it is " contradicted by the 
Bible,^^ the other that it " has no source in the gospel,'^ 
but "comes, on the contrary, from the Platonists.'' 
The reader can easily see why such strenuous efforts are 
made to show that "immortality" does not mean im- 
mortality at all, but something else. The attempt, how- 
ever, itself lamentable, has resulted, as must always be 
the case, in most miserable failure, rendering its au- 
thors, whoever they may be, objects of commiseration. 

Hereafter, wiien any advocates of inherent immor- 



164 



3iA^r xoT im:mortal. 



talitj desire to shield that theory from the overwhelm- 
ing force of the truth that it is not a child of inspiration, 
it will become them y/ell to attempt to show that the 
above named and many other learned men and leaders 
among them have studied the Bible to little purpose, on 
the cjuestion. Until they do this, it were better that 
they manifest a more mild and Christian spirit in their 
treatment of those who differ vnth them. 

• Aechbishop Whately, speaking of the reward of 
the saints, and the doom of the impenitent, observes; 

What that doom will be, whether the terms in wdiich 
it is commonly spoken of in Scripture — ^death,^ ^de- 
struction,' ^perishing,' etc., are to be understood figura- 
tively, as denoting immortal life in a state of misery, 
or more literally, as denoting a final extinction of ex- 
istence — this is cjuite a difi^erent cjuestion. It is certain 
that the words, ' life,' ^ eternal life,' ^ immortality,'' etc., 
are always applied to the condition of those, and of 
those only, who shall at the last day be approved ' as 
good and faithful servants,' who are to ^ enter into the 
joy of their Lord/ 

"^Life,' as applied to their condition, is usually un- 
derstood to mean 4iappy life.' And that theirs will ie 
a happy life, we are indeed plainly taught; but I do not 
think w^e are anywhere taught that the word ^ life ' does 
of itself necessarily imply happiness. If so indeed, it 
would be a mere tautology to speak of a ^ happy life ;' 
and a contradiction, to speak of a * miserable life;' 
which we know is not the case, according to the usage 
of any language. In all ages and couiitries, ^life,' and 
the words answering to it in other langvages, have al- 
ways been applied, in ordinary discourse^ to a wretched 
life, no less properly than to a happy ono. Life, there- 
fore, in the received sense of the word^ would apply 
equally to the condition of the ble-^t ani5 of the con- 



REVIEW OF "REV. J). GEORGE." 



1G5 



demned, supposing these last to be destined to continue 
forever living in a state of misery. And yet, to their 
condition the words Hife^ and ^immortality^ never are 
applied in Scripture. If therefore we suppose the hear- 
ers of Jesus and his Apostles to have understood, as 
nearly as possible in the ordinary sense, the words em- 
ployed, they must naturally have conceiyed them to 
mean (if they were taught nothing to the contrary) that 
the condemned were really and literally to be ^destroy- 
ed,^ and cease to exist; not, that they were to exist for- 
ever in a state of wretchedness. For they are never 
spoken of as being kept alive, but as forfeiting life: as 
for instance, ^ Ye will not come u.nto me that ye may 
Jiave life : ' — ^ He that hath the Son hath life ; and he 
that hath not the Son of God, hath not life.^ And 
again, ^ perdition,' ^ death,' ^destruction,' are employed 
in numerous passages to express the doom of the con- 
demned. All which expressions would, as I have said, 
be naturally taken in their usual and obvious sense, if 
nothing were taught to the contrary. 

" That these expressions however are to be under- 
stood not in their ordinary sense, but figuratively, to 
signify an immortality of suflFering, is inferred, by a 
large proportion of Christians, from some other pas- 
sages : as, where our Lord speaks of ^ everlasting pun- 
ishment,' ^ everlasting fire,' and of being ^ cast into hell, 
where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quench- 
ed.' 

" This last expression of his is taken from the book 
of the prophet Isaiah (Ixvi. 24), who speaks of Uhe 
carcasses of the men that have transgressed, whose 
worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; 
and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh : ' describ- 
ing evidently the kind of doom inflicted by the eastern 
nations on the vilest offenders, who were not only slain, 
but their bodies deprived of the rites of burial, and 
either burned to ashes (which, among them, was regard- 



IGO 



ITAK Ts-QT IMMOKTAL. 



ed as a great iiiclignitj.) or left to mouldei above ground 
and be devoured by worms. 

" From such passages as these it has been inferred 
that the sufferings^ and consequently, the life, of the 
condemned, is never to have an end. And the expres- 
sions will certainly bear that sense; which would per- 
haps be their most obvious and natural meaning, if 
these expressions were the only ones on the subject 
that are to be found in Scripture. But they will also 
bear another sense; which, if not more probable in it- 
self, is certainly more reconcilable with the ordinary 
meaning of the words ^ destruction,' etc., which so often 
occur. The expressions of ^ eternal punishment,' ^ un- 
quenchable fire,' etc., may mean merely that there is to 
be 710 deliverancQ — no revival — no restoration — of the 
condemned. 'Death,' simply, does not shut out the 
hope of being brought to life again: * eternal death ^ 
does. 'Fire' may be qitencliecl before it has entirely 
consumed what it is burning: ^unquenchable fire' 
would seem m^ost naturally to mean that which destroys 
it utterly. 

" It may be said indeed, that supposing man's soul 
to be an immaterial being, it cannot be consumed and 
destroyed by literal material fire or worms. That is true : 
but no more can it suffer from these. We all know 
that no fire, literally so called, can give us any pain 
unless it reach our bodies. The ^fire,' therefore, and 
the ^worm' that , are spoken of, must at any rate, it 
would seem, be something figuratively so called;— 
something that is to the soul, what worms and fire 
are to a body. And as the effect of worms or fire is not 
to preserve the body they prey upon, but to consume, 
destroy, and put an end to it, it would follow, if the 
correspondence hold good, that the fire, figuratively so 
called, which is prepared for the condemned, is some- 
thing that is really to destroy and put an end to them ; 
and is called ^everlasting' or ^unquenchable' fire, to 



REVIEV/ OF "EEV. N". D. GEORGE/' 



167 



denote that tliey are not to be saved from it, but that 
their destruction is to final. So in the parable of the 
tares, our Lord describes himself as saying, ^gather ye 
first the tares, and bind them in bundles to hum tliem ; 
but gather the wheat into my garner ; ^ as if to denote 
that the one is to be (as we know is the practice of the 
husbandman) carefully preserved, and the other, com- 
pletely put an end to." — Fiihire State, yp, 180-184. 



OHAPTEE X, 

EYERLASTIl^G MISERY. 

Here it is proper to briefly notice another and 
small class of texts, of which the following is a mem- 
ber : 

" And these shall go away into everlasting punishment : but 
the righteous into life eternal." — Matt. xxv. 46." 

These closing words of Matthew's account of the 
judgment scene depicted by our Saviour^ as well as a 
very few similar texts^ are not unfrequently urged in 
support of man's immortality. We can easily see how 
they may be so regarded, so far as respects those liv- 
ing at the time of Christ's return^ by people who hold 
the immortal-soul view, but we are certain that neither 
a simple perusal nor a close examination of the whole 
account would suggest to any stranger to that theory 
the idea of immortality of man or any thing connected 
with him. What was Jesus discoursing upon ? He 
was describing the judgment of the v/orld at his second 
coming; the judgment of those who shall be then liv- 
ing. This is undeniable; for, says he, verses 31 and 



168 



llX:^ XOT IMMORTAL. 



32, "When the Son of man shall come in his glory, 
and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon 
the throne of his glory; and before him shall be gather- 
ed all nations.'^ 

Were we to say, " all the nations of Europe are at 
wai*,^^ would any person understand us to mean that all 
the dead of those various nationalities had been raised 
to life, and were engaged in the strife ? !N"o indiyidual 
would so interpret the language : and yet it would be 
no more unreasonable to do so than to thus interpret 
the language of Jesus. Is there any thing said in the 
wholo account about a resurrection of the dead ? 
Nothing. Why, then, assume that reference is made to 
any but those who will be living at the coming of 
Christ? The language affords not the faintest intima- 
tion cf such a thiDg, much less can it be held to justify 
the ajsumption. 

Oui" Lord says, "When the Son of man shall come 
in hi^ glory, and all the holy cmg els y^ith him;" but 
he says nothing about any saints accompanying him. 
It is a signillcant fact that in all the numerous Scrip- 
ture allusions to the final consummation, the reward- 
ing of the saints, the establishment of the universal 
and everlasting kingdom, etc., etc., there is no hint 
that any part of God's people will be brought from any 
intermediate state of consciousness; but it is always 
their resurrection, their being raised from the dead. 
The fact is not only significant, it cannot be reason- 
ably accounted for on the assumption that souls exist 
somewhere in a state of consciousness between death 
and resurrection. 

No unprejudiced reader of the Bible can well fail 



REVIEW OF ^^EEY. ^^T. D. GEOHGE." 1G9 

to see that while special judgments are sometimes de- 
nounced against enemies of tlie Lord, death, the pen- 
alty Oi sin, is the general and final punishment inflict- 
ed upon all sinners : and if that death is irrevocable, as 
is the case with those who die in impenitence, then the 
punishment is everlasting, unending, Numerous 
strenuous efforts have been made to overcome the force 
of this simple truth, but they have alike utterly failed. 
It presents an insurmountable bulwark. The punish- 
ment is deprivation of life, and if the life is never re- 
stored the punishment is eternal* 

One of the fallacies by which many of our friends 
on the other side of the question are misled consists in 
assuming that death is no longer punishment when 
consciousness has ceased. It is true that punishment 
by the infliction of a corrective penalty, should, to be 
effective, be attended with consciousness, but not so with 
punishment intended to be strictly exemplary. For in- 
stance, if a man should be, for some crime, condemn- 
ed, as an exemplary punishment, to deprivation of life, 
the punisliment would commence when life was ex- 
tinct (the process of deprivation being only the means of 
infliction, and hence no part of the punishment proper), 
and will continue so long as death continues ; and no- 
body would be so absurd as to say there was no pun- 
ishment inflicted because the man was not conscious 
of the fact of his death. 

Or, again: Suppose a man were, for some offence, 
condemned to be punished by deprivation of his liberty 
for sixty days, for instance, and on the day of his in- 
carceration he should, by reason of some physical de- 
rangement, become totally unconscious, and should re- 



170 



MA^T KOT I3IM0RTAL. 



main so for fifty-nine days : could any one in author- 
ity be found to decide, at the expiration of sixty days, 
that the man had not received the prescribed punishment 
because he was unconscious during nearly the whole pe- 
riod ? Of course there could not. If men assert that 
there can be no torment in the absence of consciousness^ 
they say truly ; but to assert that eternal death is not 
etevnal p2inis7me?it because there is no consciousness of 
it is to aflfirm what a dispassionate view of the case will, 
we think, show to be a manifest absurdity. 

The language of the text plainly indicates what the 
states of the two classes spoken of w^ill be. The two 
states are opposites, and as the righteous go into life 
eternal, the eyerlasting punishment to which the wicked 
are consigned must be eternal death. This may justly 
be considered conclusive, especially as we have shown 
that "life^^ means life and not liapinness, as is so per- 
sistently and unreasonably urged. 

But there are other considerations bearing directly 
on this subject; facts connected with the Scripture use 
of everlasting, eternal, and like terms. They sometimes 
express the idea not of unending cause, but of unend- 
ing effect. This is so well set forth in the following let- 
ter, dated, London, Sept. 6, 1864, that we give it entire, 
and thus close our remarks on this point : 

" TO THE OE THE AMEEICAiNT BIBLE UIsIOI^. ' 

" Dear Fellow Laboiiees : As a knowledge of the 
sense in which the w^ords Eternal and Everlasting are 
used in Holy Scripture is essential to a comprehension 
of Divine Eevelation, and as much difference of opinion 
is now expressed respecting the sense in which these 



REVIEW OF "REV. H. D. GEORGE.'^ 



171 



words are there used^ I purpose submitting to your 
consideration a few observations upon it. 

" These words often in Holy Scripture have relation, 
only, to the duration of what has been effected, and 
not at all to the duration of what has been the cause 
of such effect — and this even in the places where there 
i'S mention only of the duration of such cause. 

" Thus where it is stated in St. Jude that the So- 
domites ^are set forth as an example, suffering the ven- 
geance of eternal fire:^ the fire of the Sodomites, if 
they were annihilated by it, was, as to them, eternal; 
they never did, or never will behold it, not continuing 
to exist ; and the example of its having been to them 
productive of such an effect, is the same as to ns; but 
the example of its being such as to its own duration, 
has no existence to any one to whom this Scripture is 
addressed, although what is stated specified alone the 
duration of the fire, which is alone the cause of what has 
been effected. Thus the qualification eternal does not 
here relate to the duration of the cause, but to the dura- 
tion of its effect. 

" Hence it is quite consistent with the language of 
Holy Scripture that in the statement in St. Mark of, 
* The worm that never dies, and the fire that is never 
quenched,' the dying and the quenching does not relate 
to the duration of the existence of either the worm or 
the fire, but to the duration of their effect on the party 
affected by them. To him that it annihilated by them, 
their existence, in the language of Holy Scripture, is 
eternal or everlasting, even though his cognizance of 
that existence was confined to a few hours, minutes, or 
even seconds. 

"But the sense of everlasting and eternal can never 
be decided until the facts revealed respecting man's na- 
ture be first determined. Does Holy Scripture reveal 
that man, under all circumstances, is an immortal ex- 



173 



MAK KOT IMMORTAL. 



istence, or that he is capable of annihilation ? We read, 
John iii. 16, that ^God so lored the world, that he 
gave his only begotten Son, that whosoeyer believeth 
on him should not perish, but have everlasting life/ 
Perish is here used to express a state opposite to ever- 
living, that is, not forever living, or, being annihilated; 
and it is never used in any other sense. God then, gave 
his Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not be 
annihilated. 

" Thus Holy Scripture reveals, That man is capable 
of a7iniliilatio7i : and yet it is true to state respecting 
him, that his worm never dies ; that the fire of his pun- 
ishment is never quenched ; and that both his punish- 
ment and his joy are eternal and everlasting. 

"In Holy Scripture language no joy can be designa- 
ted eternal, of which in itself, or in its effects, man does 
not eternally partake. 

"I remain, Dear Fellow Laborers, ever truly 
yours, "Hermaist Heijstetter." 



BEVIEW OF "KEY. D. GEOPtGE." 



173 



PART 11. 

CHAPTEE XI. 

Hayii^g shown that those parts of Scripture which 
are relied on to prove the dogma of inherent immortal- 
ity do not sustain that doctrine, we now proceed to 
demonstrate, by reference to some of the very many 
texts bearing directly upon this subject, that the con- 
trary doctrine is plainly the Bible one. 

In the early part of this work we proved conclu- 
sively, as we think, that the language tlioii shalt siirehj 
die, expressing, as it does, the penalty of transgression, 
cannot, without violating the laws of language, be un- 
derstood as meaning any thing but the literal death of 
the whole man. The language used in pronouncing 
sentence upon Adam, after the fall, not only abundant- 
ly evidences this, it renders any position based on a dif- 
ferent interpretation of the words wholly untenable. As 
therefore the penalty of the law, the " wages of sin is 
literal death, death of all that goes to make up the re- 
sponsible being, it follows inevitably that natural im- 
mortality cannot be true, and also that all conscious life 
forever ceases at death unless there is a resurrection from 



174 MA^ XOT IM^EORTAL. 

the (lead. The tei'in deaili is, of course, sometimes used 
in a tropical sense, but when it expresses or relates di- 
rectly to the penalty of sin, its meaning is deprivation 
of life. To the question, then, concerning the final 
condition of the wicked. 

THEY PEKISH:. 

The term m^V^ means, to be destroyed; to go to de- 
struction; to come to nothing; to be blotted from exist- 
ence; to lose life; to decay. It therefore means the op- 
posite of preservation, whether applied to animate or 
inanimate objects. "Neither do men put new wine 
into old bottles, else the bottles break, and the wine 
runneth out, and the bottles perisli: but they put new 
wine into new bottles, and both are preserved.'' — Matt, 
ix. 17. All will at once see the sense in which perish is 
here used ; that its meaning is the opposite of preserved, 
Perisli can never be justly held to mean preservation. 

"We shall give a few quotations explanatory of the 
original words translated Sojjlioh means to come 

to an end, 

"1 Sam. xxvi. 9, David said of Saul, 'Destroy him 
not . . . The Lord shall smite him ; or his day shall 
come to die; or he shall descend into battle and 
(sopJioJi) come to an end/ But if the 'immortal soul' 
of Saul lives, then certainly he has neither perished 
nor co?ne to an end. So in 1 Sam. xxvii. 1. 

" Another word translated perish is gova, to waste 
ay/ay, to decay. Josh. xxii. 20, And Achan gova,) 
wasted away not alone in his iniquity.' Job xxxiv. 14, 
'If God set his heart upon man, if he gather unto him- 
self his ritali, spirit, and his nesm.e, breath ; all flesh 
shall {gova,) decay together, and man shall turn again 
unto dust.' If the man decays and turns to dust again, 



REVIEW OF "EEV. Is. T>. GEORGE." 



J 75 



what is left but the spirit of the breath of lives which 
is not a conscious thing, and which God has gathered 
into the great reservoir of all animal life? Job xxxiv, 
12, ^But if they obey not, they shall {gova) waste aiuay 
bv the sword* and they shall die without knowledge.' 

A word implying the most complete destruction, 
translated ^ensA, is sliomad, to anniliilate, Psa. Ixxxiii. 
9, 10, ^ Do unto them as unto . . . Jabin, at the brook 
Kishon : who {sliomad) were anniliilated at Endor: 
they became as dung for the earth.' As living beings, 
they were put out of existence. Such language could 
not apply to such as had ^immortal souls;' but as it 
does apply to those that were annihilated at Endor, it 
proves that they had no such Pagan appendages. 

Other strong words translated perish, are ajJai 
oitvaid, utter destruction. Num. xxiv. 19, 20, 'Out of 
Jacob shall he come (Christ) that shall have dominion.^ 
And when Balaam 'looked on Amalek, he took up his 
parable, and said, Amalek Avas the first of the nations, 
but his latter end shall be {adai ouvaid) utter destruc- 
tion forever.' 23 y., ^ And he took up his parable, and 
said, Alas, who shall live when God doeth this! Aud 
ships shall come from Chittim, and shall afflict Asshur, 
and shall afflict Eber, and he also shall be {adai oicvaid) 
fitter destruction forever.^ As this is a prophecy to take 
place under the judicial reign of Christ, it must im- 
ply the final disposition of these nations — they will be 
utterly exterminated. Thus we see that many of the 
Hebrew words are much more forcible than the English 
word perish, 

"We turn to the I^. T. Kata-ptlieiro, Ptlieiro means 
to corrupt, and Icata renders the word more intensive. 
2 Pet. ii. 12, ' But these as natural brute. beasts, made to 
be taken and destroyed, speak evil of the things that 
they understand not; and shall utterly perish in their 
own corruption.' This is a terrible denunciation 
against false teachers; like the beasts made for no 



176 



MAK isOT IMMORTAL. 



other purpose but to corrupt; these like them shall 
corrupt in the utter corruption of their own nature. 
The manner of their perishing is like that of beasts ; as 
beasts were not made for eternal torments but for 
slaughter and corruption, so are these. The simple form 
of the word is applied to beasts^, and both the simple 
and intensive to these men. 

" Ajjolonto, destroyed. Jude 11 v., 'Wo is to them; 
for they haye gone in the way of Cain, and haye run 
far in the error of Balaam's hire, and have {ar)olonto) 
perished in the re bellion of Korah.' We refer farther 
to 2 Cor. ii. 15, 16; Matt, xyiii. 14; Luke xiiL 3; Acts 
yiii. 20; Psa. Ixxiii. 29; xcii. 9; Proy. xii. 9; Deut. viii. 
19; Judges y. 31; Job iy. 9, 20; xx. 7 ; Psa. ii. 12; ix. 
3; X. 16 ; xxxyii. 20; Ixyiii. 2; Ixxxiii. 1; cxii. 10; Isa. 
xli. 11; Acts xiii. 41; 1 Cor. i. 18; viii. 11; xy. 18. 
These thirty-two texts declare that the wicked shall per- 
ish ; and perish always implies death.'^ — Bible vs. Tra- 
dition. pp. 237-239. 

Job XX. 4-7, "Knowest thou not this of old, since 
man was placed upon the earth, that the triumphing 
of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite 
but lor a moment? Though his excellency mount up 
to the heavens, and his head reach unto the clouds; 
yet he shall jperisli forever^ like his own dung.^' 

We cannot but feel that no person, unless he be 
thoroughly fortified with prejudice, can read this pas- 
sage and not be impressed w^ith the fact that ^^/'^.V^ is 
here employed to exi)ress the idea of absolute, literal 
destruction. It can mean no less. The comparison in- 
stituted is such as to render any doubt concerning the 
true meaning of the text a simple absurdity. 

Psa. xxxyii. 20: '^But the wicked shall ])erisli, and 
the enemies of the Lord shall be as the fat of lambs: 
they shall consume; into smoke shall they consume 
awa r 



EE VIEW OF REV. ^q". 3. GEORGE." 177 

Can the reader conceive of any arrangement of words 
which would more emphatically and unquestionably de- 
clare the destruction of the wicked? They "shall be as 
the fat of lambs.^^ Is there any thing about the fat of 
lambs that is indestructible ? Does it continue forever ? 
No, it consumes away. Thus it is with the wicked. 
They shall consume. Their destruction is as absolute 
as the fat of lambs, which consumes away " into smoke." 

Psa. xlix. 12, 14: "Nevertheless, man being in hon- 
or abideth not: he is like the beasts that perish. . . . 
Like sheep they are laid in the graye ; death shall feed 
on them ; and the upright shall have dominion oyer 
them in the morning ; and their beauty shall consume 
in the graye from their dwelling." 

Here the Spirit declares particularly with reference 
to such wicked as are of high estate in this world. They 
are rich and proud. " Their inward thought is, that 
their houses shall continue forever, and their dwelling 
places to all generations : they call their lands after their 
own names." Yet notwithstanding their high estate, 
and their wealth and its accompanying power, they are 
like the leasts that perish. Like sheep they are laid 
in the graye. How are sheep put in the graye, sheolj 
the state of death ? They are put in it never to return 
out. perish and are as though they had not leen. 

So, saith the Spirit, is it with the wicked. Death feeds, 
or pastures on them, consuming them utterly. Dr.. 
Clarke says Hoiibigant reads the yerse thus : 

" Like sheep they shall be laid in the place of the 
dead ; death shall feed on them : their morning shep- 
herds rule oyer them, and their flesh is to be consumed. 
Destruction is to them in their folds.'' 



178 



]via:n' kot immortal. 



How is it possible for such language as occurs in the 
lorty-ninth Psalm^ in describing the destiny of the im- 
penitent, to be understood in any other way than as 
teaching the destruction of the wicked ? Certainly 
no right-minded person will seriously question that to 
become like beasts at death, or to be like beasts in death 
is to be made an end of forever. Death pastures on 
them and coiisitmes them. In contrast to the condition 
of the unrighteous, the psalmist says : "But God will 
redeem my soul from the power of the grave/^ slieoly 
the state of death (the reader will remember that Da- 
vid's soul was David himself: "God will redeem me.'') 
Thus we have it all. Those of one class are redeemed 
from death, while those of the other are not redeemed 
hvii2)BTisli therein. "Man that is in honor, and und^r- 
standeth not, is like the beasts that ])erisliP There 
is no gainsaying this plain and direct testimony of in- 
spiration. It is the w^ord of God, who cannot lie. Let 
us, then, believe it and conform our faith to it rather 
than attempt to make it conform to our faith. 

" A false witness shall not be unpunished, and he 
that speaketh lies shall perish^ — Prov. xix. 9. 

Here the wise man speaks in strict conformity with 
all other inspired testimony. They who die in their 
sins ^h-dXl perish. 

Luke xiii. 1-5 : " There were present at that season 
some that told him of the Galileans, vdiose blood Pilate 
had mingled with their sacrifices. And Jesos answer- 
ing said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galileans 
were sinners above all Galileans, because they suffered 
such things? I tell you, Nay: but except ye repent, 
ye shall all likewise perish. Or those eighteen, upon 



PtEYIEW OF "HEY. i^". D. GEORGE." 



179 



whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew tliem, think 
ye that they were sinners above all men that dwell in 
Jerusalem ? I tell you, ISiay : but except ye repent, ye 
shall all likewise perish/' 

Here again there can be no serious question as to 
the meaning of But if those wicked men had 

immortal souk they could not be said to perish. A^ery 
many of those Jews who repented not did perish, first 
by the Eoman sword, and subsequently in the destruc- 
tion of Jerusalem. 

2 Cor. ii. 15 : For we are unto God a sweet savor of 
Christ, in them that are saved, and in them that jjer- 
ishr Here is a reference to the final destiny of the tv/o 
classes, when the righteous have been saved and the un- 
godly have perished, lost their being. 

1 Cor. XV. 17, 18: "And if Christ be not raised, 
your faith is vain ; ye are yet in your sins. Then they 
also which are fallen asleep in Christ are perished,^' 

The apostle urges upon the Corinthians the fact 
that if there is no resurrection of the dead, then Christ 
is not raised, and even those who have died in the faith 
are perished, thus sharing in the lot of the wicked. This, 
however, Avould be an impossibility if men possess im- 
mortal souls. 

Orthodoxists insist that perish, when applied to 
the destiny of the wicked, implies that they are con- 
signed to endless misery. But if the righteous have 
undying entities which pass at death into a state of hap- 
piness, how, if there be no resurrection, can they be said 
to " have perished ? It could not consistently be said 
of them, for it would not be true. But if, as the New 
Testament plainly teaches, men are dependent, x'or a 



180 MA^ ]S"OT I3IM0RTAL. 

future life, upon a resurrection from the dead, then it 
follows ineyitably that if there should be no resurrec- 
tion, the righteous dead have 2^erisJiecl, lost their be- 
ing entirely, like the wicked. 

John Wesley admits that according to Paul's ar- 
gument, if there be no resurrection then "they which 
have fallen asleep in Christ'' have lost their life and 
leing together'' When a man loses life and leing togeth- 
er, he cannot be alive in any sense whatever. The man 
is then annihilated. 

Defenders of the theory of inherent immortality 
should not permit themselves to overlook Paul's ob- 
ject in introducing this argument to prove a resurrec- 
tion. In writing to the Corinthians Paul knew, of 
course, that if he could show to those who denied the 
resurrection, that their doctrine involved the position 
that such of their beloved associates in the faith as hau 
died were lost, they could not fail to see their error. 
Hence he did show them that the doctrine of a future 
resurrection is not only true, but all-important, for 
should it not transpire, then their brethren who had 
died in the faith are lost, perislied. But if the righteous 
were in a state of ha23py consciousness between death 
and resurrection, and surely if they had conscious- 
ness at all it would be a happy one then, as we have 
remarked, it could not be said, even if there should be 
no resurrection, that they which have "fallen asleep in 
Christ are perished.'^ It could not be said because it 
would not be true. 

Says Lange's Commentary: 

"If Christ did not rise for our justification, then 
those whose death seemed but a blessed sleep to a hap- 



REVIEW OF '*REY. :Nr. D. GEORGE/' 181 

py awaking in fellowship with their living and glorified 
Itedeemer, so far from having been received into eternal 
life, were doomed to still abide under the wretched do- 
minion of death. A consequence like this must have 
made too profound an impression upon the loving dis- 
position of Christians to be lightly allowed." 

It may be said that these remarks of Lange are in- 
consistent with his known views concerning the state 
of the dead. True, but he nevertheless here frankly 
states the point of Paul's argument. As to inconsist- 
ency, we confess to never having read a so-called or- 
thodox commentary, or theological work of any kind 
which is not self-contradictory. And this arises from 
the fact that the popular faith is absolutely irrecon- 
cilable with Scripture teaching. Lange remarks in con- 
nection with what we have just quoted, that perdition 
is "the state of damnation, remaining in Gehenna," But 
how, even in the event of there being no resurrection, 
the righteous can be said to remain in Gehenna, a place 
to which no one will claim they are assigned, must re- 
quire a wonderfully skilled theologian to see. Men may 
say what they will, but there stands the fact that if 
there be no resurrection of the dead, then they also 
which have fallen asleep in Christ are perislied and 
most persons know what perished means. Paul could 
not have thus based the Christian's whole hope of be- 
ing saved from perisliing upon a resurrection from the 
dead, if, resurrection or no resurrection, they were not 
only immortal and could not perish, but were happy in a 
disembodied state. 

In View of' the theory, therefore, that they 
which have fallen asleep m Christ" are already enter- 



1S3 



MAN KOT IMMOETAL. 



ed upon the enjoyment of heavenly blessedness^ or any 
degree of blessedness, will any candid person nndertnke 
to tell ns how their being saved irom peris/iing depends 
upon the resurrection of Christ? If they are immortal 
and in a state of happiness, then they are secured 
against all danger oi 2^erisMng whether Christ has or 
has not risen. To suppose they who fell asleep in 
Christ either before or after his death, but especially be- 
fore, were placed beyond the possibility of perishing in 
the event of Christ's failure to come forth from the 
grave, is to render Paul's language both meaningless 
and absurd. 

The apostle expresses precisely the same idea in the 
following : 

1 Cor. XV. 32 : "If after the manner of men I have 
fought with beasts at Ephesus, what advantageth it me, 
if the dead rise not ? Let us eat and drink, for to-mor- 
row we die." 

Upon the assumption that the real, thinking person 
is conscious between death and the resurrection, and 
in the case of believers that consciousness is a h^ippy 
one, Paul must have been guilty of extreme folly in 
saying that if the dead rise not, "let us eat and drink, 
for to-morrow we die,'' for he could net be ignorant 
of the fact that thus himself and all saints would be 
uiu])mlcablij advantaged, even if the dead shall never 
rise. He did not argue, "if the dead rise not we still 
have immortal entities that must either be happy or 
miserable, and hence we must deny ourselves and la- 
bor faithfully in the cause of Christ,'^ Xo, nothing of 
that ; but he stakes all upon the resurrection of che derid, 



EEVIEW OF "TvEV. K. D. GEORGE." 



183 



and says, if there is no truth in that, if sucli an event 
is never to transpire, let us eat and drink and enjoy life 
upon true Epicurean principles, for to-morrow we die, 
and beyond that there is nothing. 

There is no such thing as misunderstanding this lan- 
guage of the apostle. His position is, if no rGsurrection^ 
710 future life ; a proposition whiclr would be utterly 
baseless if men never wholly lose life. The question, 
"What advantagetli it me," is a strong way of putting 
the negative. It is equal to the assertion that liis whole 
struggle in defence of Christianity was but a fruitless 
and aimless hazarding of life, "if the dead rise not." 
But could tliis be so if the righteous liaye a future re- 
ward other than that which comes by a resurrection ? 
Plainly it could not. One of the most popular com- 
mentaries seems to seek to break the force of Paul's lan- 
guage thus: 

"Ie the dead eise itot? This clause is not to be 
connected with what precedes (as in the E. V.,) as thougn 
designed to explain the words ' after the manner ot men 
eras forming a second condition to the question just 
put" (what advantagetli it me?) "although accord- 
ing to the sense, it belongs with it; but because of the 
concinnity of the clauses, it must be connected with 
what follows." 

Who does not see that the phrase in question "be- 
longs" to the whole text, and cannot, without irjjustice, 
be severed from it. If, howeyer, it were otherwise, our 
friends of the popular faith concerning man's nature 
and destiny would be welcome to all the aid and com- 
fort it would afford them. For how, pray tell us, does 
it essentially affect the matter whether it be said, " what 
advantageth it me, if the dead rise not ?" or whether ife 



184 



HAiq- XOT IM:MOrvTAL. 



be said, "if the dead rise not, let us eat and drink, for 
to-morrow we die?" In either case all hope of re-* 
ward is made to depend upon a resurrection from the 
dead. 

Commenting on this passage, a writer of some City 
years since remarks : 

"If, during the whole of my stay at Ephesus, I have 
encountered the most savage treatment from wicked and 
interested men, who were ready to devour me like beasts 
of prey, this conflict, as well as many others, I have 
endured with resolution and cheeriulness, animated by 
the hope of a recompense at the resurrection of the 
just. But, upon the principles that some among you 
adopt, what have I to expect ? It were better for us all, 
if there be no resurrection, and no future lite, (for with- 
out a resurrection there can be no life to come,) to re- 
nounce the Christian religion, which requires temper- 
ance, self-denial, and self-government, and to adopt at 
once the licentious maxim of the Epicurean philoso- 
phy; As life is short, and we have nothing to expect 
hereafter, let us make the most of it while we live, and 
indulge ourselves without restraint in the gratification 
of sense and appetite. 

" Observe here, the great stress which the apostle lays 
upon the doctrine of a resurrection of the dead. The 
whole expectation of a future life rests upon the fact 
If there is no resurrection, there is no life to come : 
otherwise the apostle's argument is of no weight." 

Dr. Priestley, also commenting on the text, says: 

" It is evident from this passage that the apostle had 
no idea of any hope after death but upon the doctrine 
of a resurrection. In all his writings he never men- 
tions, nor alludes to, any state of consciousness between 
death and the resurrection ; not even when he is com- 
forting Christians on the death of their deceased friends^ 



REVIEW or "KEY. 1^. I). GEORGE.'^ 185 

on which occasion it was in a manner unayoidable, 
and indeed it never was or could be overlooked by any 
person who really believed it. Here he says, if the dead 
rise not, all ends with this life, and therefore we may 
as well make the most of it. But this inference would 
be by no means just, if happiness or misery awaited the 
souls of men after death, though there should be no 
resurrection of the body.^^ 

As Paul stated to the Corinthians, and that, too? 
in the same chapter, "Moreover, brethren, I declare 
unto you the gospel,^^ and yet said nothing whatever 
about any soul entity, but set forth the resurrection as 
the only means of obtaining a future life, it follows that 
there can be no reasonable question as to which is 
truth. There can be no such thing as consciousness 
in death, according to Paul, and he is in harmony with 
all other inspired testimony, and hence is right in as- 
serting that if there is no resurrection, then they who 
fell asleep in Christ ijerisliecl, which is, says John Wes- 
ley, lost their life and leing together. The same apostle, 
seeking to comfort those brethren at Thessalonica who 
had lost friends by death, thus wrote. 

"But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, 
concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, 
even as others which have no hope. For if we believe 
that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which 
sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. For this we 
say unto you by the Vv^ordofthe Lord, that we which 
are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord, shall 
not prevent them which are asleep.^^ 

If the conscious existence of an entity between death 
and resurrection formed any part of Paul's theology 
this was just the occasion for him to make some mention 



186 



of iL ; for he could and, of course, would Lave told his 
brethren that their deceased friends are happy now, 
and will accompany Christ when he descends. Most 
theoiogists of the present time are so well satisfied with 
their faith in the idea of glorification in death they for- 
get to say any thing about Christ's return. How unlike 
Pauline theology is theirs. Upon no rational hypothe- 
sis can the absence both here and in the fifteenth chap- 
ter of the first epistle to the Corinthians, of all allusion 
to such a doctrine be harmonized with the assumption 
that he believed it. 

It is well known that prevent, in the passage, is used 
in the sense of jj^rcc^f?^. In earlier English literature it 
hid that meaning, and the translators so used it as a 
proper representative of the Greek term. We cannot 
justly suppose the apostle would undertake so objectless 
and senseless a task as would be that of assuring the 
Thessalonian brethren that their friends who had died 
in the faith shall not be left behind when the living 
saints are caught up to meet our coming Lord, if those 
friends are already vv^ith Christ when he comes, and so 
cannot possibly be left behind. Such language under 
such circumstances would be absurd. 

The language and the circumstances necessitate the 
conclusion that Paul is here consistent with what he 
wrote to the Corinthians. The great idea in all his writ- 
ings on the subject is that as the salvation scheme was 
perfected by the resurrection of Christ, so salvation of 
believers from perishing is only by a resurrection of 
those who have died, and an analagous change in those 
then living. Hence it is he comforts mourners with the 
assuj:ance that they vv^ho are alive and remain unto the 



REVIEW OF ^^EEY. JST. D. GEORGE." 



187 



coming of the Lord/' shall not go iefore, precede, he glor- 
ified sooner than they who have fallen asleep, for " the 
dead in Christ shall rise first : then we which are alive 
and remain, shall be caught up together with them in 
clouds" (omit the) "to meet the Lord in the air: and 
so shall we ever be with the Lord." Thus all wall be 
glorified together. Even believers^ then, who go down 
into death cease to praise God, and are silent in that state 
until he Vfho has power over it shall come and unlock 
its prison doors and let his people go free, never more to 
be subject to it. May all our readers see to it that their 
names are written in the " book of life," that so they 
may share in that glorious triumph. 

John iii. 14-16 : " And as Moses lifted up the serpent 
in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lift- 
ed up : That whosoever believeth in him should not per- 
ish, but have eternal life. For God so loved the world, 
that He gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever be- 
lieveth in him should not perish, but have everlasting 
life." 

Having heretofore shown that the Bible meaning 
of " everlasting life," "eternal life," etc., is just what the 
terms naturally import, it is at once seen that perish^ 
in the text, being put in contrast to eternal life and 
everlasting life, must, beyond all reasonable question, 
mean the very opposite of those terms. God gave His 
only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him 
should not 2^erish, go out of existence forever, but should, 
at the divinely appointed time, happily now near at 
hand, have everlasting life. 

It is notable that the second part of ver. 16 is ;? re- 
petition of ver. 15. It is significant as making emphat- 



188 



MAK IsOT IMMORTAL. 



ic not only the great objective fact of salvation, but as 
no less emphatically showing v/hat it is that God gave 
His Son to save men from. And as none but those who 
looked upon the brazen serpent which " Moses lifted up/' 
experienced the saving influence which followed the act 
of looking upon it, so faith in Christ, who was raised 
up from the dead, and is now exalted to the right hand 
of God, is believed to be essential to the salvation of all 
who hear the gospel. 

Acts xiii. 40, 41: Beware, therefore, lest that come 
upon you, which is spoken of in the prophets; Behold, 
ye despisers, and wonder, and perish.^' 

2Pet. ii. 12: "But these, as natural brute beasts, 
made to be taken and destroyed, speak evil of the things 
that they understand not; and shall utterly perish in 
their own corruption/^ 

There is little excuse for misapprehension of language 
which asserts that certain wicked men were "to betaken 
and destroyed,^ like" brute beasts," and shall utterly per- 
ish in their oiun corruption. Such language could not 
be applied to beings possessed of an incorruptible na- 
ture and therefore incapable of perishing. 

John X. 27, 28 : " My sheep hear my voice, and I 
know them, and they follow me : and I give unto them 
eternal life ; and they shall never perish, neither shall 
any man pluck them out of my Father's hand.'^ 

2 Pet. iii. 9 : " The Lord is not slack concerning his 
promise, as some men count slackness ; but is long suffer- 
ing to us-ward, not willing that any should ^m^A.'^ 

2 Thess. ii. 10 : " And with all deceiyableness of un- 
righteousness in them Va-iit perish ; because they receiv- 
ed not the love of the truth, that they might be saved.'' 

Acts viii. 20: "But Peter said unto him. Thy money 



REVIEW OF "EEV. I^. D. GEORGE." 189 

perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift 
of God may be purchased with money." 

Perish, when it expresses the doom of ungodly men, 
means, it is said, to suffer eternal misery. We must, 
then, understand Peter as saying, " Thy money suffer 
eternal misery with thee," for money and possessor were 
denounced alike. But how absurd! "As wax melteth 
before the fire, so let the wicked perish at the presence 
of God." 

Many more texts might be quoted to show that they 
who die in impenitence perish forever, but we think 
enough has been done to satisfy any candid mind, Man 
is an animal being. As such he is mortal, and unless 
God shall exercise His preventing power, the whole race 
must perish. But this He proposes to do. " God so 
loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, 
that luhosoever lelieveth in him should not ^erishP It 
is only those who lelieve that are subjects of that pre- 
venting powsr, hence no promise has been made to save 
unbelievers from perishing. Believers are saved by a 
resurrection from the deal ; but unbelievers have no 
part in it, they being unworthy " to obtain " it, and so 
they perish utterly. May all lovers of Jesus faithfully 
labor to lead sinners unto him, and thus swell the num- 
ber of them who shall, through the Son, obtain the price- 
less gift. 



190 



CHAPTER XIIo 

THE VaCKED SHALL LE DESTROYED. 

Webster defines the term destroy — "To unbuild; 
to pull down ; to break up the structure and organic 
existence of; to ruin; to bring to nought; to put an 
end to ; to annihilate.^^ 

Destroy and destruction are many times used in 
the sacred Scriptures with reference to meu, and when 
so used they mean deprivation of life; their meaning 
is directly opposed to preservation of life. Like "per- 
ish/*' when they are applied to wicked men^ they denote 
extirpation. Of such as make not God their strength; 
but trust in the abundance of their riches, and strength- 
en themselves in wickedness, it is said: "God shall 
likewise destroy thee for ever: he shall take thee away, 
and pluck thee out of thy dwelling place, and root thee 
out of the land of the living." — Psa. lii. 5. When a 
man is removed out of the "land of the living," and 
destroyed for ever, he surely cannot be alive. Thus a 
^destroyed person cannot be a living one. 

Psa. cxlv. 20 : " The Lord preserveth all them that 
love him : but all the wacked will he destroy." 

Here it is plainly stated that God will ])reserve the 
faithful, but the wicked He ^ill destroy. The objector 
will say, this has reference to the present state; the 
righteous are preserved and prospered, while the wicked 
are abased and their counsels brought to nought. But 
can that be the meaning of the inspired language? 
That the ungodly very frequently glorify themselves, 
and triumph throughout life is a known fact, and 



REVIEW OF "r.EV. X. D. GEORGE." 



191 



abiintlantly recognized. The psalmist himself says, 
*^ How long shall the wicked triumph? IIow long 
shall they utter and speak hard things ? and all the 
workers of iniquity boast themselves ? They break in 
pieces thy people^ 0 Lord, and afflict thine heritage." 
Thus we see that then, as novf, the machinations of en- 
emies of God were by no means always rendered fruit- 
less; but were often permitted to triumph until death 
put an end to them. It is the final condition that is 
spoken of: the righteous are preserved in death, ^. 
redeemed from it, but the wicked are destroyed for ever 
in death. 

But it is sometimes objected that "destruction" and 
perish," are sometimes used in Scripture with refer- 
ence to the righteous as well as to the wicked, or vv^ith 
reference to both indiscriminately. This is true, so far 
as the Old Testament is concerned, and the fact settles 
it that the terms cannot mean everlasting misery, for no 
one will contend that the righteous are consigned to that 
An intelligent and earnest Bible student must refuse to 
recognize some plain facts before he can fail to see tbat 
while it is true that these terms, when applied to the 
wicked, as wicked, inevitably imply that they shall not be 
re-established, but shall remain destroyed, yet when 
they are applied to men generally they do not preclude 
a re-establishment, a re-living. Should not Omnipotent 
Power be exercised on behalf of any dead, none would 
ever live again ; but sacred pages teem with promises 
of a resurrection of all the worthy ones, a re-living of 
every righteous son and daughter of Adam. 

But not so with the unrighteous; for "when the 
wicked spring as the grass, and w^hen all the workers 



192 



MAIST is"OT IM:M0RTAL. 



of iniquity do flourish, it is that they shall be destroy- 
ed for everp — Psa. xcii. 7. " He that, being often reprov- 
ed, hardeneth his neck, shall suddenly be destroyed, 
and that without remedy/^ — Pro v. xxix. 1. The destruc- 
tion of the ungodly is tuWioiit remedy : but the resur- 
rection furnishes a remedy for the death and destruc- 
tion of the righteous. Like him who became the first- 
fruits of the resurrection harvest, they shall not be 
Jiolden of deaths for he who has power over death has 
announced his purpose to open its gates and let Ids 
people go free. They "shall be raised incorruptible,'^ 
and the righteous living at that time " shall be chang- 
ed to incorruption ; "For this corruptible must put on 
incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.'' 
When this has transpired, death will have been " swal- 
lowed up in victory." Then, looking down into empty 
graves and upon a conquered foe, there shall ascend 
from the redeemed ones the triumphant shout, " 0 death, 
where is thy sting ? 0 grave, where is thy victory ? 
What of the wicked then ? Theirs is the blackness of 
darkness forever : their end is destruction. 

The ditterence in the destiny of the two classes is 
clearly set forth in the word of God, spoken by the 
prophet Isaiah. He says: "0 Lord our God, other 
lords beside thee have had dominion over us : but by 
thee only will we make mention of thy name." " They 
are dead, they shall not live ; they are deceased, they 
shall not rise : therefore hast thou visited and destroy- 
ed them, and made all their memory to perish." Now 
mark the contrast. Those wicked ones that " have had 
dominion" are dead, they shall not live; they are de- 
ceased, they shall not rise^ therefore, because this is so. 



REVIEW OE "REV. is". D. GEORGE." 193 

because they are not to live again, God has visited and 
destroyed them, and made all their memory to perish; 
iiit " Thy dead men sliall live, together with my dead 
body sliall tJiey arise. Awake and sing, ye that dwell in 
the dust," etc. 

How unmistakable and emphatic is this language. 
No ambiguity : all is plainly expressed. Yet, clear as 
it is, were it at variance with the general tenor of 
Scripture teaching; did a literal construction contra- 
dict other well understood portions of Scripture, we 
would feel bound either to give it a different interpre- 
tation, or let it alone entirely. But the fact is it is in 
perfect harmony not only with the general tenor of 
Scripture inculcation, but with all well understood in- 
spired testimony bearing on the subject. Hence to in- 
terpret it literally is a necessity. To do otherwise is to 
wander from the path of safety, incur great danger, and, 
therefore, to commit a grave error. 

Psa. xxxvii. 38 : "But the transgressors shall be de- 
stroyed together : the end of the wicked shall be cut 
off." 

If, as is claimed, the real and responsible man is a 
separate entity which continues to exist in a conscious 
state, then, whether happy or miserable, transgressors 
are not destroyed ; nor can they at all be said to be cut 
o/, if they have (or rather are) immortal souls which 
exist separately from the organization. The fact is the 
text is one of the strongest in the whole Bible. The 
term rendered destroyed is shomad^ which means anniTii- 
lated. Transgressors shall be annihilated. Thus we 
can comprehend the full import of the phrase cut off. 



194 



MA^T KOT IMMORTAL. 



^' For yet a little while^ and the wicked shall not be/^ If 
they shall not ie they surely must first be destroyed. 
And this is true, for " eyil-doers shall be cut off so 
of course they shall not be. 

We have heretofore shown that God's promises to His 
people that they shall inherit a certain land necessitates 
a resurrection from the dead. Hence the Spirit declares : 
" Wait on the Lord^ and keep his way, and he shall ex- 
alt thee to inherit the land'' (the land promised to 
Abraham and his seed, but which that patriarch never 
possessed a foot of) : "when the wicked are cut off, thou 
shalt see it." — ver. 34. "Mark the perfect man, and be- 
hold the upright : for the end of that man is peace." — 
ver. 37. The e7id of the perfect man is peace in the 
confident assurance that, being heir to the promise, he 
will be raised from the dead. Now mark the con- 
trast. But " the e7id of the wicked shall be cut offJ^ 
The end of one is peace in the faith of a future life, 
while the other is "cut off." So explicit is the language 
o'f inspiration, it would seem impossible to misappre- 
hend it. But alas! the mischievous phantom of inhe- 
rent immortality is ever on the alert, turning its victims 
a svay from the truth. 

Prov. xiii. 13 : "Whoso despiseth the word shall be 
destroyed : but he that feareth the commandment shall 
be rewarded." 

Destruction is the end of all despisers of the word. 
"As the fire devoureth the stubble, and the flame con- 
sumeth the chaff, so their root shall be as rottennc??s. 
. . Because they have cast away the law of the Lord of 
hosts." The Spirit declares that God preservetli not 
the life of the wicked." Modern theology declares, on 



REVIEW OF "REV. I^. D. GEORGE.'^ 195 

tlie contrary, that God does preserve the life of the wicked 
for the purpose and for the purpose of tormenting 
them forever, permitting, as ages upon ages roll away, 
no ray of light or hope to reach them. As the fire de- 
voureth the stubble^ and the flame consumeth the chaff, 
so shall the wicked be destroyed forever. 

God has said concerning the enemies of His people, 
" For yet a very little while, and the indignation shall 
cease, and mine anger in their destruction.-^ — Isa. x. 25. 
He further declares that He " bringeth the princes to 
nothing." The destruction of God's enemies, then, is 
equivalent to their being brought to nothing ; and when 
that state is reached His anger ceases, a thing which 
could not be truly said if He continues forever to be angry 
with His enemies, and to preserve their existence for the 
purpose of displaying His anger by tormenting them. 
What a fearful and unjustifiable departure from the 
truth is the theory that God's anger will never cease : 
that He w^ill take pleasure in tormenting His enemies 
forever, the glorified saints all the while delighting ia 
the agonies of those most dear to them in this life. Oh 
what a libel is it upon the character of a just, all-good, 
all-loving Father ! He will not do that terrible thing. 
No, no, His anger will cease in their destruction. 

Isa. xl. 23 . That bringeth the princes to nothing* 
The Heb. here is, to ccin, nothing: in 38: 17, Is de- 
fined the same, nothing: and they are both also de- 
fined, not; which includes, says Ges, under ain, the sub- 
stantive verb to be, exist; making not to be, not to ex- 
ist. Theology of Bible. 

Jer. x. 24 : ^^0 Lord, correct me, but with judgment; 
not in thine anger, lest thou bring me to nothing." Thus 



196 



HAK l^OT IMMOETAL. 



it is seen tliat the prophet believed God sometimes brings 
men to nothing. Few will deny that to be brouglit; to 
nothing is to be made an end oi^ as the psalmist de- 
clares, Psa. ix. 5.^ Thou hast rebuked the heathen, 
thou hast destroyed the wicked, thou hast put out their 
name forever and ever," 

" Fur destruction from God was a terror to me/^ — 
Job xxxi. 23. That, then, which was a terror to Job 
was not eternal misery but destruction. Poor, misguid- 
ed Job (if popular theology were true), thus to be ter- 
rified at something which could not 230ssibly happen to 
him. Our friends of the torment school will take no- 
tice that fear of ^^destruction" does exercise a restrain- 
ing influence. Destruction is the end of all sinners. 

And the destruction of the transgressors and of the 
sinners shall be together, and they that forsake the 
Lord shall be consumed." — Isa. i. 28. All this being the 
tenor of 0. T. Scriptures concerning the ungodly, very 
many more passages might be adduced, but we forbear 
and proceed to the 

IsEW TESTAirE:N"T. 

Matt. vii. 13, 14 : " Enter ye in at the strait gate ; for 
wide is the gate, and broad is the way, that leadeth to 
'destruction, and many there be which go in thereat: 
because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, 
which leadeth unto life; and few there be that find it." 

The Saviour here puts "life" and '^destruction" 
in contrast. As, beyond all reasonable question, life 
means life, and not something entirely di3*erent, it fol- 
lows inevitably that destruction, standing in contrast 
to life, involves complete cessation of living existence. 



" REVIEW OF "REY. GEORGE." 107 

Matt. X. 28: '-And fear not them which kill the 
body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather 
fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body 
in hell" (both life and being in gehenna). 

Eeferring the reader to chapter ii. of this work, 
where this passage is treated at length, we confidently 
place it in the list of texts which teach the destruc- 
tibiiity of the whole man. It is said that God is aile 
to destroy the whole being of man, and He has also de- 
clared that He will destroy the persistently rebellious, 
" And ye shall do no work in that same day ; for it 
is a day of atonement, to make an atonement for you 
before the Lord your God. . . . And whatsoever soul it 
be that doeth any work in that same day, the same soul 
will I destroy from among the people." — Lev. xxiii. 28- 
30. And again: It shall come to pass, that every 
soul, which will not hear that prophet, shall be dis- 
troyed from among the people." — Acts iii. 23. 

Phil. iii. 18, 19 : "For many walk, of whom I have 
told you often, and now tell you even weeping, that 
they are the enemies of the cross of Christ; whose 
end is destruction,^^ 

Here we have it 'again distinctly stated that the 
<'nd of the wicked is destruction. Destruction, say 
gome of our friends of the torment faith, here means 
eternal misery ; that it is the end of the impenitent. 
What profound reasoning ! A person is born into the 
world, lives out a few years of iniquity, and then 
passes into a state of terrible suffering, there to be 
continued forever : and that, it is claimed, is the end of 
him, although he is to have no end, and hence may be 
said to have yet hardly begun to exist. Thus, too, 



198 



MAiq- KOT IMMOETAL. 



untold millions of ages are made the end of a few 
years. How extremely preposterous! When ten 
times ten thousand years have rolled away his exist- 
ence would, comparatively speaking, have but jusfc 
begun ; and yet men who are rational on other sub- 
jects talk about an eternity of misery being the end of 
sinners. We know of nothing in all the world more 
absurd than the plea that an eternity of living existence 
is the e7id of a man. 

It may be objected to this that Paul speaks of an 
end " being " everlasting life.^^ True, but he does not 
say the end of believers is everlasting life. He says 
to the church at Eome, ^^What fruit had ye then 
in those things whereof ye are now ashamed ? for the 
end of these things is deatliP (N"ot so, says modern 
theologjr, the end of these things is eternal life in mis- 
ery. Thus they contradict Paul.) "But now being 
made free from sin, and become servants to God, ye 
have your fruit unto holiness, and the end everlast- 
ing life." The apostle simply and plainly affirms that 
the end or fruit of unrighteousness is death; v/hile 
the end or fruit of righteousness is everlasting life. In 
the passage under consideration it is perso7zs whose end 
is declared to be destruction. The uniform testimony 
of inspiration is that the end of all enemies of Christ 
is death, destruction. Very strong evidence of the error 
of popular theology on this subject is the fact that in 
order to sustain itself it is compelled to attach to plain 
words a meaning in no sense their own, thus purposely 
mystifying what God has made clear. 

2 Thess. i. 9 : " Who shall be punished with everlas6- 



REVIEW OF ^^REV. JiT. D. GEORGE." IDD 

ing destruction from the presence of the Lord, and 
from the glory of his power," 

The subjects of this punishment are such as " know 
not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord 
Jesus Christ." If the wicked exist forever in a state of 
misery, and, as is affirmed, God will be present exert- 
ing his power in tormenting them forever, they being 
thus made to always feel and acknowledge the might 
and gl'ory of his power, then who, pray tell us, does 
not see that the language, punished with everlast- 
ing destruction from the presence of the Lord and ficm 
the glory of his power," is sheer nonsense ? Does the 
Spirit thus utter worse than meaningless words ? Let 
them who insist upon an exposition which involves 
such an imputation beware lest they come into condem- 
nation, for believers must stand before the judgment seat 
of Christ 

According to the theory we oppose there is no such 
tiling as being destroyed "from the presence of the 
Lord, and from the glory of his power." But as " the 
wages of sin is death," and sinners shall be punished 
with utter destriiction, then when they are put back 
into nothingness, from whence they were taken, they 
will be removed from the presence of the Lord and the 
glory of his power. In no other way will they be. 
There can be no such thing as consciousness beyond 
the glory of God's power, for it is by His sustaining 
power that all things exist. But the word of God is true. 
Wicked people will be punished with everlasting des- 
truction from the presence of the Lord. Surely the 
truth is so plain none who desire to see it can well fail 
to do so. 



200 



MAiT l^OT IM^IOriTAL. 



1 Tliess. V. 3: '^For when they shall saV; Peace and 
safety; then sudden clGstriiction cometli upon them/^ 
If this is not destruction at all but unending snfici- 
ing, then it could not properly be said to be sudden, 
for how would it sound to say, '"'^ then sudden eternal 
torment cometh upon them ? 

Phil. i. 28 : " And in nothing terrified by your ad- 
versaries: which is to them an evident token of per- 
dition, but to you of salvation, and that of God/^ 
The Syriac reads: ^' And in nothing be ye startled, by 
those who rise up against us ; (which is) an indication 
oi th^iv destriiction, oi life for you/^ Destruction 
and life are again found contrasted. Destruction, 
therefore, is the opposite of life; it is abiding in death. 
Archbishop Newcombe says of the passage: "Which 
constancy, as it shows the truth of that Gospel which ye 
believe, is to your adversaries a proof that they deserve 
destruction for rejecting it, and for persisting in their 
vices." See also Mark xii. 9 ; Luke xvii. 26-30 ; xx. 
16; Eom. ix. 22; ITim. vi. 9; 2 Pet. ii. 1, and many 
others. 

1 Cor. XV. 26: "The last enemy that shall be des- 
troyed is death." 

Every enemy, then, is to be destroyed, death being the 
last one. But hov/ can this be if enemies of God are 
never to be destroyed but continued forever. Bishop 
Whately remarks : "' We are told by Pciul, 1 Cor. xv, 
25, that Christ ^ must reign till he hath put all ene- 
mies under his feet,' and that the Mast enemy that 
shall be destroyed is death.' And this does not seem 
consistent with the continuance forever of a vast num- 
ber of wicked beings, alive and hating Christ, and odious 



REVIEW OF '-HEY. In. D. GEORGE." 201 

in his siglit.'^ Truly it does not. There is no way of 
harmonizing popular faith on this question with the 
inspired testimony of Paul. 

THE^DOOM OE THE I:,IPEXITE:s^T IS DEATH. 

Directing attention to our remarks concerning death, 
(chap, i.,) as the penalty of the law, the wages of sin, we 
must regard it as a proved position that the Scripture 
use of "death," in such connection, is extinction of life 
True, theology gives it another meaning in such cases, 
but in all instances v/here theology differs with the 
word of God, we prefer the latter. Paul, writing to 
the Romans, and referring to certain ones who were 
guilty of many dark sins, says: "Who knowing the 
judgment of God, that they which com.mit such things 
are worthy of deaths — ^Rom. i. 32. Some will insist, 
notwithstanding the very frequent testimony of inspir- 
ation to the contrary, and never at all in favor, that 
almost countless millions of the finally impenitent will 
forever suffer indescribable agony; and others that a 
time will come when the sins of all mankind, not ex- 
cepting the most rebellious, will be expunged, and all 
who have ever lived be redeemed to God, but here, 'n 
all the power of its divine emanation, stands the solemn 
declaration of Paul, "'that they which commit such 
things are loortliy of deatli!^ 

Rom. vi. 16 : "' Know ye not, that to whom ye yield 
yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom 
ye obey; whether oi mi unto death, or of. obedience 
unto righteousness ? " 

Rom. vi. 21 and 23: "What fruit had ye then in 
those things whereof ye are now ashamed ? for the 
end of those things is death. For the wages of sin ia 



202 



MA]^ KOT IMMOETAL. 



death; but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus 
Ciirist our Lord." 

Eom. yii. 5: '^For when Aye were in the flesh, the 
motions of sin, which were by the law, did work in 
our members, to bring forth fruit unto deatliP See also 
Eom. viii. 13. Surely no Bible student can fail to see 
how plainly the word of God teaches that " the soul that 
sinneth it shall dieP 

Eeader, dost thou live after the flesh? Dost thou 
grieve the Spirit of grace, yielding obedience to fleshly 
lusts ? Then this know^ that thou hast no life in 
thyself other than a mere animal one, and if when that 
ends thou hast failed to lay hold on the Spirit of life in 
Christ Jesus, thine must be the blackness of darkness 
forever. There can be no comparison between a lifs 
running through a few short years of sinful pleasure 
here, and that life of unalloyed happiness extending 
along the unbroken ages of eternity, and which God 
would have you obtain upon the simple conditions im- 
posed. Were your whole life one of faithful service you 
would simply render to God His due, and eternal life 
would still be a gift. You would still be indebted to 
Him for all that "exceeding and eternal weight of 
glory " which they shall experience who have part in the 
resurrection at the coming of Jesus. 

Eemember what God has done for you. Eemember 
the humiliation, labors and sufferings of Christ, his 
degradation and poverty, how he " that was rich be- 
came poor for our sakes " that we " through his pov- 
erty might be rich," and then say if this " great sal- 
vation " is not of more value than all things else beside. 
Life and death are set before you. One or the other 



REVIEW OF ''REV. D. GEORGE." 203 

must be your destiny ; the choice is with yourself. To 
the one you are rapidly tending ; to the other the Son 
of God has made it easy for you to attain. If you 
choose the better part, ^' when Christ, who is our life, 
shall appear," you will be accounted worthy to " appear 
with him in glory." But if you serve self, you will die 
as the fool dieth ; and when the righteous are glorified 
you wall be left in death as too vile and corrupt a thing 
to have any place either in heaven or on all the earth. 
Think, then, what God has done and proposes to do 
for you. He has given His own Son and asks you to 
believe on him. 0, then, give yourself entirely to Him. 
Believe, repent, obey. 

Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he reap. For 
he that soweth to the flesh shall of the flesh reap cor- 
TiqMon^^ (death); "but he that soweth to the Spirit, 
shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting." — Gal. vi. 8, 

CHAPTEE XIIIo 

DEVOURED, COiirSUMED. 

It is sometimes said of the wicked that they will be 
devoured, and sometimes that they will be consumed. 
We again quote from Biile vs. Tradition : 

" The word devour, to eat up, when applied to the 
wicked, implies their total consumption and annihilation. 
Lev. X. 2 : ^ There went out fire from the Lord, and de- 
voured them, and they died before the Lord.' Jer. ii 
30: ^Your own svrord hath devoured your prophets, 
like a destroying lion.' Devour here implies death, and 
destruction by fire or sword. Ps. xxi. 8, 9: 'Thine 
hand shall find out all thine enemies. Thou shalt make 



204. 



MAX XOT IMMOETAL. 



them as a fiery oven in the time of thine anger: the 
Lord shall swallow them up in his wa^ath^ and the fire 
shall devour them/ Isa. x. 16: 'Therefore shall the 
Lord, the Lord of hosts, send among his fat ones lean- 
ness; and under his glorj he shall kindle a burning 
like the burning of a fire. And the light of Israel shall 
be for a fire, and his Holy One for a fiame : and it shall 
burn and devour his thorns and his briers (the wicked) 
in one day; and shall consume the glory of his forest, 
and of his fruitful field, iofh soul and lody, (life and 
being,) and they shall be as when a standard-bearer 
ijhololi) is consumed,' Isa. xxyi. 11: 'Yea the fire of 
thine enemies shall devour them/ Isa. xxxiii. 11: ^Ye 
shall conceive chaff, ye shall bring forth stubble ; your 
breath as fire shall devour you ; and the people shall 
be as the burnings of lime ; as thorns cut up shall they 
be burned in the fire.' 14 v. : ' The sinners in Zion are 
afraid ; fearfulness hath surprised the hypocrites, Who 
among us shall dwell (or live) with the devouring fire ? 
Who among us shall dw^ell (or live) w^ith everlasting 
burnings ? ' Says Paul, ' How shall we escape, if we 
neglect so great salvation ? ' All these questions imply 
the impossibility of escape, for it is impossible for him 
to dwell (or live) in a devouring or everlasting fire with- 
out being consumed. Can a devouring fire fail to de- 
vour its fuel ? If it devours, it must consume the 
wicked. Everlasting, in this place, means lasting till 
the fuel be entirely consumed. Heb. x. 27, There re- 
maineth to the wicked, ^ A certain fearful looking for 
judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the 
adversaries.' Xahumi. 8: ^Darkness shall pursue his 
enemies. What do ye imagine against the Lord ? he 
will make an utter end: affiiction shall not rise up a 
second time. For a while they be folded together as 
thorns, and while they are drunken as drunkards, they 
shall be devoured as stubble fully dry.'. Eev. xx. 9 : 'A 
fire came down from God out of heaven and devoured 



KEYIEW OF '^REY. D. GEORGE.'^ 



205 



them.' See iilso Psa. ]. 9 ; Ixxvi. 7; Jer. y. 14. Here 
are eleven times that the word devour is applied to the 
end of the wicked. After sinners are devoured, we see 
not how even God himself could inflict more punish- 
ment upon them v/ithout raising them again to life ; but 
such sure work vv^ill God make with sinners tliat it will 
not be necessary to afflict them a second time, 

"THE WICKED WILL BE COJI^SUMED. 

" Consume, in its application to the wicked, implies 
to waste away; to cause to pass avv^ay; to bring to utter 
ruin ; to exterminate; to burn up. But we will see its 
Bible exposition. In the 0. T. it is Tcololi^ to consume^ 
finish, come to an end. Ex. xv. 7 : ' Thou sen test forth 
thy wrath, which consumed them as stubble.^ Here 
Pharaoh and his host were consumed by being drowned 
in the sea. Num. xvii. 13 : ' Whoso cometh . . near . . 
-the tabernacle . . shall die : shall be consumed with dy- 
ingo' Psa. Ixxi. 13 : ' Let them be confounded and con- 
sumed that are adversaries to my souU Isa. i. 28; ^The 
destruction of the tmnsgressors and of the sinners shall 
be together, and they that forsake the Lord shall be 
consumed.^ Isa. v. 24: ^ As the fire devoureth the stub- 
ble, and the flame consumeth the chaff, so their root 
shall be as rottenness, and their blossom shall go up as 
dust; because they have cast away the law of the Lord.^ 
Zep. i. 2: ^ I will utterly consume all things from off 
the land, saith the Lord, I will consume man and beast ; . 
I will consume the fowls of the heaven, and the fishes 
of the sea, and the stumbling-blocks with the wicked ; 
and I will cut off man from off the land, saith the 
Lord.^ Isa. xlvii. 14: ^Behold they (the astrologers) 
shall be as stubble ; the fire shall burn them ; they shall 
not deliver their souls (original and margin,) from the 
power of the flame.' Their souls then being under the 
power of the flame, will surely be consumed. But their 
souls, means themselves. Granted. They will be ut* 



206 



MAIsT IsOT IMMORTAL. 



terly consumed, soul and being. See also, Deut. iv. 24; 
1 Sam. xxii. 25 ; Job iv. 8, 9 ; xy. 34 ; xx. 26 ; Psa. Ixxxv. 
3; Isa. X. 22, 23 ; xvi. 4; xxviii. 22; xxix. 20; 1. 9. 

" Here are twenty times that the Bible plainly de 
Clares the wicked shall be consumed in destruction 
This cannot be made compatible with continued exist- 
)ence in misery." 

How yery strange is it that men persist in closing 
their eyes and hearts to such plainly expressed truth ? 
But Christendom is beginning to learn. Very many 
will yet receiye and boldly teach the great truth that 
God is indeed a God of loye, and that He will not pre- 
serve sinners and torment them, but will have a uni- 
verse free from everything which will not praise His 
great and holy name. The many, however, even of 
Christians, will most likely continue to sit in darkness 
until the glorious appearing of our Lord and Saviour 
Jesus Christ, to establish his kingdom with justice and 
with judgment and reign forever. 



OHAPTEE XIV. 

THE WICKED WILL BE BURKED. 

As sacred history distinctly informs us that many 
of the wicked have in the past been destroyed by fire, 
so various portions of Scripture clearly show that 
yery many, at least, of the wicked who are alive at 
the coming of Christ will be destroyed by the agency 
of fire, either in conflagration or the no less destruc- 
tive fire of war. It is said of the "sons of BeliaP^ 
that they " shall be all of them as thorns thrust away,^' 
und " shall be utterly burned with fire.^^ If, like thorns 



REVIEW OF "REV. IT. D. GEORGE." 207 

cast into the flame^ they were tdterly bitrned with fire 
they surely cannot be still unburned. 

Mai. iv. 1: "For, behold, the day cometh, that shall 
burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do 
wickedly, shall be stubble : and the day that cometli 
shall hum tliem iip, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall 
leave them neither root nor IrancUy 

Those who hold 'that the wicked will be eternally 
preserved in their sin and shame, will pardon the 
thought that the best way for them to " dispose of this 
text is to lelieve it. There have been various attempts 
to weaken or remove altogether the force of the lan- 
guage, but they have not been sufficiently reasonable 
to command the serious attention of men conversant 
with the Scriptures touching the subject. 

How can a person more directly contradict God tlian 
by affirming that the Avicked will liv3 forever, always 
hating and blaspheming, when He has so emphatically 
declared of some that they shall be burned up ? The 
term used by way of comparison, renders it quite con- 
clusive that litter destruction and not preservation is 
meant, for stubble is not preserved when put in the 
fire: it is consumed. Mr. George, like some others 
of the common faith, does not believe the language of 
the text implies the destruction, the " annihilation ^' of 
the wicked referred to, but that it refers to the '^judg- 
ment day." We quite agree with him that it repre- 
sents the judgment of those to whom it directly refers 
but how can that indicate that literal destruction is not 
meant? His theory does not concede that the wicked 
will at "the judgment" be so completely consumed 
that there shall be left of "them neither root nor 



208 



branch/^ so he finds it conyenient to have it refer only to 
what is termed the judgment day. But as he and those 
of the popular theory contend that the whole being 
of the wicked will from thence forever be inesevved in 
order to be tormented, they still put themselves in a 
position of direct antagonism to the testimony of in- 
spiration. All will see that such a position is totally 
at variance with the word of God. We think it not un- 
likely that the prophecy has reference in part to the 
great destruction of the Jews by the Eomans. That 
day was most assuredly their judgment. 

The wonderful thought is conceived that if the pro- 
phecy refers to the final judgment, as it is called/ then 
it is opposed to our position, for as we do not believe 
that the wicked dead vvill have a resurrection, all the 
proud and wicked will not then be burned up root and 
branch. Even upon the supposition that the language 
has particular reference to the judgment that shall take 
place at the coming of Christ, this objection is purely 
imaginary, for the language neither sustains it nor ren- 
ders it reasonable. There is nothing about the text 
to suggest the thought, much less compel the conclu- 
sion that the wicked dead are to be raised for the pur- 
pose of being destroyed again. When the judgment 
commences tlien all (the then living) that do wickedly 
will be as stubble, not all who have (throughout the 
past) done wickedly. We find it difficult to believe 
that our author himself attaches any weight to his ob- 
jection, in view of the whole text. We care not whether 
the language be held to have reference to a judgment 
now in the past, or to one yet future ; in either case 
the . complete destruction of sinners is foretold. 



EEYIEW OF "EEY. X. D. GEORGE." 



209 



Dr. Adam Clarke admits that the expression sludl 
leave til cm neither root nor Irancli, was a proverbial 
one "for total destruction." If the wicked are totally 
destroyed, there is neither "root nor branch " left; but 
if they are preserved it is simply folly to say they are 
destroyed, root and Irancli, The fact is the text is 
so plain any attempt to tamper with it is wlioUy inex- 
cu sable. 

The Spirit declares concerning the Lord, ^VA fire 
goeth before him, and burnetii up his enemies round 
about." — Psa. xcvii. 3. It is also said, "And the strong 
shall be as tow, and the maker of it as a spark, and 
they shall both lurn together, and none shall quench 
them." — Isa. i. 31. All are well aware that when tow 
is set on fire it is burned up, utterly consum.ed. The 
Saviour declared that in the great harvest, at the end 
of the world, he "will say to the reapers. Gather ye 
together first the tares, and bind them in bundles and 
burn them." It cannot be reasonably claimed that the 
Vficked, since Jesus has compared their final destiny to 
the destruction of tares by fire, are never to be reaily 
destroyed. Were the common theory concerning them 
true, the comparison would be altogether inadequate 
and improper. 

Matt. iii. 11, 12: "I indeed baptize you with water 
unto repentance: but he that cometh after me is 
mightier than I, . . . he shall baptize you with the 
Holy Ghost, and with fire. Whose fan is in his hand, 
and he v/ill thoroughly purge his floor, and gather 
his wheat into his garner; but he will turn up the 
chaff* with unquenchable fire." 

Chaff here represents the wicked. It is said they 



210 



MA^q- Is'OT IMMORTAL. 



will be separated from the wheats the righteous, and 
be iiirned up with linqiiencliaUe fire. Is there any 
thing about the expression " unquenchable fire " which 
indicates that the fire is never to go out? Certainly 
not. It is unquenchable because it cannot be qitenclied^ 
but continues to burn until it consumes that which 
it burns. A house takes fire and, despite all efforts to 
save it, is consumed. They who did all in their jDOwer 
to save the property are asked if they could not have 
subdued the flames. Their reply is, No, the fire 
was unquenchable,'^ This was true; the fire was un- 
quenchable, yet it went out of itself when it had 
consumed the house. A writer truly says : 

^^But, continues the objector, ^ The fire that burr.s 
up the wicked is called ' eternal fire,' and their punish- 
ment is called ^eternal damnation.' We reply, 1. That 
it is called a consuming fire and a chvoicri7ig fire ; and 
if it consumes and devours it must utterly destroy the 
wicked. 2. Supposing that the word aionas, tranJ5- 
lated 'eternal,^ meant what the English word import.^, 
without beginning and without end — which it cer- 
tainly does not, and which the reader will see whea 
w^e discuss the meaning of this v/ord — even when take a 
in the broadest sense contended for, it can imply no 
more than that the instrument of destruction is ever- 
lasting. To say that a fire will continue to burn what 
it does not consume, is a solecism in language. If pure 
gold is indestructible in fire, then it cannot be burned ; 
if the wicked are indestructible, they can neither be 
burned nor injured by fire. 3. Everlasting fire, or fire 
lasting till it has utterly consumxcd its fuel, is an ap- 
propriate emblem of total and everlasting destruction. 
If the fire were not to last thus long, some vestiges 
of the wicked, such as bones, v/hich are the most in- 
destructible, might possibly remain. And 4. We re- 



KEYIEAV OF ^' EEV. D. GFOr.GE." 



211 



ply, that in Heb. \i, 2. ^ye read of eternal judgm<Mit/ 
mid this and •eternal lire/ only mean that in both cas-s, 
it will be final, the results will be everlasting ; the wick- 
ed will continue burned up : they will never rise ag jin ; 
they will be consumed, annihilated, exterminated; they 
wiir remain under the power of death forever : and as 
men, they will be as though they had never been. It 
is frivolous to tell us that the elementary principles will 
remain ; we know that, but we know too that as liv- 
ing men or beings they vrill not be. Ashes and gases 
are not conscious beings, and to such things the wick- 
ed will be reduced.'^ 

It is written that the cities of Sodom and Gomor- 
rah are set forth as an example, suffering the venge- 
ance of eternal flre.*^ — Jude vii. "What happened to 
those cities ? Thev, to^-ether with their inhabitants, 
were lurncd up. consumed. They are said to have 
suffered the vengeance of eternal fire.'^ But does the 
fire still continue? Xo, it ceased thousands of years 
since; it came to an end when it had consumed that 
which was subjected to it. And the Inhabitants of 
those places are said to have suffered the vengeance of 
eternal fire, because the effect of the fire, destruction, is 
eternal, hence those vricked people will never have 
any future life. They are totally destroyed, and in this 
they are an example unto others. God, by ^'turning 
the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned 
them with an overthrow, making them an example 
nnto those that after should live ungodly.'^ If the Sod- 
omites are now in some secret place suffering tor- 
ment, they cannot be a paf.tcrn to others, for no such 
state is spoken of ; but their destruction by fire is an ex- 



ample, or pattern to others, and as sacli it clearly sets 
forth the doom of the ungodly. 

Other Scripture testimony might be adduced, in 
corroboration of what we have Vv^ritten, to show that 
tile wicked will be destroyed, many of them, by the 
agency of fire, but enough has, we think, been said on 
this point. That the wicked will all cease to be is the 
uniform testimony of inspiration. The wages of sin is 
death/' literal death. The soul that sinneth it shall 
die:\ The end of those things is "deaths ^^When 
lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, 
when it. is finished, bringeth forth death.^' — Jamesi. 
15. 

Dr. Whedon, Methodist, in his JsTew Testament com- 
mentary, only a part of which is yet published, writ- 
ing on Eom. yi. 23, says : 

"Wages of Si^^ — The hire which the master Sia 
pays to his servants is death. And this death, the 
antithesis of eteexal life, and measured in dura- 
tion by it, is eternal decdli, decUh that knovfs no re- 
surrection. The reverse, eter:s'AL life, the result of 
the service of Jesus Christ our Lord, is not a wages, 
but a free and bounteous gift.'^ 

The wages of sin is death; and if men die in their sins, 
theirs is eternal death, death that knows no resurrec- 
tion. 



EEYIEW OF "BEV. i^". D. GEORGE.'^ 



213 



CHAPTEE XY. 

WnAT POPULAR THEOLOGY DOES WITH SI^^-NEES. 

nAYi:N'G shown what the Bible teaches respecting 
ihe future of the finally impenitent, we will now brief- 
ly consider the disposition which orthodoxy would 
make of them^ and the reader will have no difficul- 
ty in determining whether its theory is justified by rev- 
elation, or is a purely human invention. Orthodoxists 
difi*er somewhat as to the degree and kind of suffering 
to y/hich the wicked are subjected, but they agree that 
all enemies of God are consigned to a place termed 
hell, where tliey will be tormented to all eternity. Hell 
is a term form{3rly in common use, and its signification 
was wholly unlike the av/fal meaning given it by mod- 
ern theology. Dr. Adam Clarke says : 

"The word hell comes from the Anglo-Saxon, helan, 
to cover or hide, hence the tiling or slating of a house is 
called, in some parts of England, (particularly in Corn- 
wall) heling to this day ; and the covers of books (in 
Lancashire) by the same name.^^ 

The author of " Bible vs. Tradition " remarks con- 
cerning the term : 

"It is of Saxon origin, and is derived from the verb 
Jielan^ and was spelled hele, helle, hell, heil and helan. It 
meant, to hele, or to hell, heal, hill, shell, hulk, shovel, 
shiel, shield, shawl, i. e., to cover up, to hide. The 
word in its primitive form is still retained in the 
eastern and especially the icestern counties of England; 
and means something hidden or covered, the grave. To 
hele over a thing is to cover it. The word hell is still 
retained in the English liturgy, according to the old En- 
glish translation of sheol,\u.Vm. xlix. 14; Ixxxviii. 3; 



214 



MA:^?• XOT lilMORTAL. 



Ixxxix. 40; it is now altered ia those places to grave. 
Those who wish to trace this word liell to its origin 
may consul b Lord King's History of the Creed, ch- 
iv.; Doddridge on Eev., i. 18; LeigJi^s Grit Sacr. in 
haides ; and Junius' Etymology, Anglican in Heile 
and liele,^^ 

The word is found fifty-two times in the common 
English translation, and is so rendered from the word 
sliQol of the Old Testament, and liades, gelienna, and 
tartarusj of the New^ Testament. Since the word had 
not at that time any such meaning as a place of con- 
scious suffering, it is not unfair to suppose that the 
translators merely meant by it the grave, the concealed 
or unseen place, sometimes the state of death, and 
sometimes, perhaps, the process of punishing with 
death combined with the state of death. Certain it is 
that in no one of the fifty-two instances of its use does 
it mean a place w^here the wicked are tormented, or a 
place of long-continued suffering of any kind. 

Slieol, the only word in the Old Testament translated 
hell, is three times rendered ^7^^, thirty times grave, and 
thirty-one times liell, Sheol is, therefore, rendered hell 
a less number of times than it is 2^^^ grave. The 
reader will bear in mind that the term has the same 
general meaning, no matter by w^hat English word it is 
represented. One of the Old Testament texts relied on 
to support the modern idea of retribution, is Psa. ix. 
17 : " The wicked shall be turned into hell (s/ieol) and 
all the nations that forget God.^^ Of course the text 
does not at all favor the torment theory except as the 
word Jiell is associated in the mind with a place of 



REVIEW OF *'nEV. X. I). GEORGE." 215 

torture. Just as reasonably might the following texts be 
claimed in support of that theory. 

Job xiv. 13: Oh that thou wouldst hide me in 
the grave (sheof), that thou wouldst keep me secret, 
until thy wrath be past^ that thou woiildst appoint me 
a set time, and remember me." JTone will be so ex- 
tremely absurd as to suppose that Job desired to go to 
a place of torments, the theological hell. Again : 
Job xvii. 13 and 16: "If I w^ait, the grave (sJieol) is 
mine house. . , . They shall go down to the bars of 
the pit (sheol), when our rest together is in the dust." 
Job, then, desired to go to sJieol because he believed he 
would there rest in freedom from his many sorrows^ 
and that God would " remember him in due time- 
in the resurrection morning. 

During the reign of Hezekiah God sent Isaiah the 
prophet to him with this message : " Thus saith the 
Lord, Set thine house in order : for thou shalt die, and 
not live." — Isa. xxxviii. The good old king was not 
well pleased with the message, and he immediately be- 
gan to pray that he might be spared yet longer, a rather 
strange proceeding on his part if he expected to go 
to glory at death. His prayer being answered, and 
fifteen years added to his life, he tells how he felt in 
the near prospect of death, "I said, in the cutting off 
of my days, I shall go to the gates of the grave (sJieol)/ 
Did the man who could say, " Kemember now, 0 Lord, 
I beseech thee, how I have walked before thee in truth, 
and with, a perfect heart, and have done that which 
is good in thy sight," expect, in the event of death, 
to be consigned to a place of torment? Impossible? 
He praised God for answ^ering his prayer and keeping 



216 



MA^q- IsOT IMMOETAL. 



liim longer out of sheol, " the pit of corruption/^ and 
declared : " For the grave (sheol) cannot praise thee, 
death cannot celebrate thee,'^ So while it is altogether 
improper to suppose Hezekiah at that time anticipated 
should lie die, an entrance into a place of suffering, it 
is equally improper to maintain, since he afSrms to 
the contrary, that he expected to be conscious in death, 
for, good man as he was, if he was conscious he would 
certainly praise God. He believed, as it is written, 
that there is no device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, 
in the grave {s7ieol)J^ 

But let us go further back. When Jacob saw what 
he thought was conclusive evidence of Joseph's death, 
he said : I v/ill go down into the graye {slieol) unto 
my son mourning." — Gen. xxxvii. 35. And Vv^hen, 
some years later, the brethren, at Joseph's command, 
would take Benjamin down to Egypt, Jacob said: "If 
mischief befall him by the way in which ye shall go, 
then shall ye bring down my gray hairs with sorrow to 
the grave {sheol),'' All know that Jacob was a servant 
of God. Had slieol in all these and other texts been 
rendered hell, nobody would be so simple as to belieye 
that it means a place of misery. By whatever term 
sheol was rendered, it should have been rendered by 
that term in all the texts where it occurs, for it has 
always the same general meaning, and is not a place of 
consciousness. 

" What man is he that liveth, and shall not see death? 
shall he deliver his soul" (himself) "from the hand of 
the grave {sheol) V — Psa. Ixxxix. 48. " For in death 
there is no rememlrance of thee : in the grave {sheol) 
who shall give thee thanks ? " — Psa. vi« 5. If there is no 



REVIEW OE "EEV. IST. D. GEORGE." 217 

remembrance in slieol, the state of death, there surely is 
no consciousness there, and if no consciousness then 
certainly no sufifering. 

The word hell occurs about twenty-four times in 
the New Testament. Eleyen of these it is rendered 
from the Greek word hades, and twelve times from 
gehenna, (For the meaning of gehenna see ch. ii., of 
this work.) Hades corresponds with sheol, of the Old 
Testament, and has the same general import. 

The reader will see that the Bible hell is not a place 
where the wicked are tormented, but that the right- 
eous as well as the wicked go there, the latter to 
remain forever, and the former to remain until he who 
has the keys of death and of hell (hades, the grave, 
the state of the dead) shall set them free; as it is 
written — "The gates of hell shall not prevail against 
"my church." If none of the righteous — no mem- 
bers of Christ's >church go into hell (hades), what 
propriety is there in ; the assurance of Christ that it 
shall not prevail against his church. The language 
affirms, by implication, that the members of Christ's 
church are subject to the power of hell (hades, the 
state of death), but as it will finally be overcome and 
destroyed, so far as his church is concerned, it will not 
prevail against them. It will, however, prevail against 
Christ's enemies, for he has neither promised nor 
threatened to deliver them from it. 

Let us now see how strangely the theological hell 
contrasts with the Bible one. Mr. Benson will doubt- 
less be regarded good Methodist authority on the subject, 
he being recognized as a standard writer on Method- 
ism. Hear his description. He says : 



218 



MAK ^?"0T IMMOETALo 



God is present in hell ill his infinite justice, and Al- 
mighty wrath, as an unfathomable sea of liquid fire? 
where the wicked must drink in everlasting torture. 
The presence of God in his yengeanee, scatters darkness 
and woe through the dreary regions of misery. As 
heaven w^ould be no heayen if God did not there 
manifest his love ; so hell would be no hell if God did 
not there display His wrath. It is the presence of God 
which gives everything virtue and efficacy; without 
which there can be no life, no sensibility, no power. 
God is therefore himself present in hell to see the 
punishment of those rebels against his government, 
that it may be adequate to the infinitude of their 
guilt. His fiery indignation kindles, and his incensed 
fury feeds the flames of their torments; while his pow- 
erful presence and operation maintains their bein^, 
and renders all their powers most acutely sensible; thus 
setting the keenest edge upon their pain, and making 
it cut most intolerably deep. He will exert all his di- 
vine attributes to make them as wretched as the capa- 
city of their being will admit." 

Reader, do not turn carelessly away, saying, " This 
(S a Methodist view of hell ; no others hold such views 
concerning it." One of America's most eminent di- 
vines, a theologian and a scholar, speaking of hell, said : 

"But to help your conception, imagine your- 
selves to be cast into a fiery oven, all of a glowing heat^ 
or into the midst of a glowing brick kiln, or a great 
furnace ; imagine also, that your body was to be there 
a quarter of an hour, full of fire, as full within and 
without as a bright coal of fire, all the while full of 
^uick sense, how long would that quarter of an hour 
seem to you ? . . . But what would be the effect on 
your soul, if you knew you must endure the torments 
twenty-four hours ? How much greater if for a year 



REVIEW OP '-RET. iT, J), GEORGE." 319 

for a thousand years! 0, then, liow would your heart 
sink if you knew you must endure it foreyer! That 
after millions of millions of ages' your torment would be 
no nearer an end than when it began! But your tor- 
ments in hell will bo immensely greater than this 
illustration represents ! ! . . . The woes of sinners in 
hell will not be a cause of grief to saints in heaven, 
but of rejoicing. " This rejoicing will be the fruit of 
an ciTiiicible disposition, and a perfect holiness and 
conformity to Christ. . . After yo'ur godly parents 
shall haye seen you lie in hell millions of ages, in tor- 
ment day and night, they y/ill not begin to pity you 
then ; they will praise God that his justice appears 
in the eternity of your misery."^ 

One of Europe's most eminent living divines says : 

" When thou diest thy soul will be tormented alone ; 
that will be a hell for it; but at the day of judgment 
thy body will join thy soul, and then thou wilt have 
twin hells ; body and soul shall be together, each brim- 
full of pain, thy soul sweating in its inmost pore drops 
of blood, and thy body from head to foot suffused with 
agony; conscience, judgment, memory, all tortured? 
but more, thy head tormented v/ith racking pains; 
thine eyes starting from their sockets with sights of 
blood and woe ; thine ears tormented with 

" Sullen moans and hollow groans, 
And shrieks of tortured gliosts ; " 

thine heart beating high with fever ; thy pulse rat- 
tling at an enormous rate in agony ; thy limbs crack- 
ing like the martyrs in the fire, and yet unburnt ; thy- 
self put in a vessel of hot oil, pained, yet coming out un- 
destoyed; all thy veins becoming a road for the hot feet 
of pain to travel on; every nerve a string on which the 
devil shall ever play his diabolical tune of helFs un- 
utterable lament; the soul forever and ever aching^ 
and thy body palpitating in unison with thy soul. 



220 



KAK KOT IMMOETAL. 



Fictions, sir? Again I say, they are no fictions, and, 
as God livetli, but solid, stern truth. If God be true 
and this Bible be true, what I have said is the truth, 
and you will find it one day to be so. 

" There is a real fire in hell as truly as you have a 
real body — a fire exactly like that we have on earth in 
everything except this — that it will not consume though 
it will torment you.^^ 

But even worse than all, if that be possible, is this 

stanza of Dr. Watts : 

There is a never-ending hell, 
And never dying pains, 
"Where cliildren must with demons dwell, 
In darkness, fire and chains." 

None will doubt the sincerity of the authors of 
the forgoing descriptions: in the terrible darkness of 
their ignorance have they spoken. Awful blasphemy it 
is, and eminently cakulated to make men allior the 
very name of God and religion. The doctrine of in- 
herent immortality is responsible for this blasphemy. 
All orthodoxists will not admit, of course, the truth of 
the pictures drawn, but they do agree that hell is a 
place where the wicked are eternally subjected to ex- 
cruciating torture. It is not strange that myriads have 
been compelled to seek refuge in TJniversalism and 
Eestorationism, and that still more, perhaps, have be^n 
driven into the darkness and almost hopelessness of ac- 
tive infidelity. The latter class, not questioning that in- 
herent immortality and eternal torments are taught in 
the Bible, reject both doctrine and Bible as equally un- 
worthy of belief. 

Can it be any wonder that this is so when Christians 
defend and proclaim a doctrine which turns an all- 



EEVIEW OF "EEV. D. GEORGE." 221 

loving and long-suffering God into an infinitely more 
cruel and vindictive tyrant than humanity with all 
its weaknesses and proneness to cruelty and tyranny 
ever yet developed ? a doctrine which unseats rea- 
son and exalts a demon to her throne? l^o wonder 
Edwards himself, when thoughts of endlesss misery 
thronged on him, was so burdened that he would 
walk "his room for hours together with tears and 
grief." 'No wonder that Dr. Albert Barnes had a simi- 
lar experience, and in the midst of his amazement, 
perplexities and doubts, exclaimed : " I am struck 
dumb — it is all dark, dark to my soul, and I cannot dis- 
guise it" No wonder Saurin exclaimed : 

I sink under the weight of this subject ; and I 
declare, when I see my friends, my relations, the peo- 
ple of my charge — when I think that I, that you, that 
we all are threatened with these torments — when I see, 
lathe lukewarmness of my devotions, in the languor 
of my love, in the faintness of my resolutions and de- 
signs, the least evidence though it be only prolctble or 
])resitin]jtive, of my future misery, yet I find in the 
thought a mortal poison which diS'ases itself into every 
period of my life, rendering society tiresome, nourish- 
ment insipid, pleasure disgustful, and life itself a cruel 
bitter — I cease to wonder that a fear of hell has made 
some melancholy, and others mad." — Sermon pui- 
lished ly The American Tract Society. 

God present in hell feeding " the flames of their tor- 
ments" with " His incensed fury," and lest the victims 
of His " wrath" should perish quite, maintains " their 
being, and render^ all their powers more acutely sensi- 
Me /" God exerting his almighty power to preserve the 
lives of the creatures He has made, and ever at work to 



222 



keep them brimful of pain making them sweat iu 
every "pore drops of blood suffusing them '^with 
agony" "from head to foot/^ and torturing their con- 
science, judgment and memory ! God, a Eedeemer who 
shed bitters tears when contemplating the fate of a 
doomed city, angels and the whole sainted host look- 
ing dov/n upon writhing sufferers in hell and re- 
joicing and taking sweet delight in the spectacle of 
"the devil" playing "his diabolical tune of hell's un- 
utterable lament" on every sensitive nerve of those they 
once loved on earth ! The redeemed saints, made "per- 
fect in holiness and conformity to Christ," and hence 
possessing a truly "amiable disposition," thrilled w4th 
ecstatic emotions as they behold the eyes of their 
once loved ones " starting from their sockets with sights 
of blood and woe," and praising God anew as ever and 
anon there comes to their ears the sweet, sv^eet sounds 
of 

*^ Sullen moans and hollow A'roans. 
j And shrieks of tortui'ed ghosts 1'^ 

Oh, shame, shame on a theory of which such vile 
and damning stuff is the legitimate offspring! And this 
is that which many love so well as to declare that if it 
were not true they "would cease to love God;" they 
would " serve self and enjoy the pleasures of sin." If in 
their questionable service they are impelled by such 
motives, then they are just simply serving self and 
nothing more. They do what they do for the purpose 
and onl?/ for the purpose of keeping out of the fire. 
Such might as well throw off the mask and serve self 
openly, for God will not accept their hollovf offerings. 
" Give me thine heart," is the requisition. 



REVIEW OF '^UlLY. iT. D. GEORGE." 



2-23 



It will avail notliingj in attempfcing to seek relief 
from the awful responsibility of teaching such a doc- 
trine, to say, I do not believe in the doctrine of tor- 
ture, but of unhappiness,^^ Eternal iinhappiness is eter- 
nal torture, and the theory in any form, no matter how 
modified, represents God as cruel and vindictive, 

THE EFFECT OF BELIEYIiTa THE DOCTRIKE. 

This theory of the destiny of the wicked is be» 
iieved, professedly, by the major portion of its patrons 
to possess in an eminent degree the power of restrain- 
ing men from evil. Few indeed who have thought 
much on the subject, who have observed closely and 
considered the various aspects of the question have 
failed to see that such is not its tendency. Most of 
those who affirm it to be a salutary doctrine are prac- 
tical deniers that it is so. Several considerations con- 
spire to justify this conclusion, and among them is 
the fact that the doctrine is but little preaclitd. 
That this is so is both undeniable and extensively rec- 
ognized and acknowledged. Eev. Dr. Curry, editor of 
the (N. Y.) " Christian Advocate/^ in an editorial 
some time since said : 

"The doctrine of future retribution^' (eternal tor- 
ments in a theological hell), "above all others, has been 
permitted to fall out of notice ; so much so that a Uni- 
versalist might be a constant hearer in almost any of 
our evangelical churches, and very seldom hear his 
notions interfered with from the pulpit." 

Why is it so ? , In one of two things will be found 
the true explanation. Either they, like certain heath- 
en who taught a similar doctrine in connection with 



224 



MAK KOT IMMOHTAL, 



immortal-soulism, do not tliemselyes believe it; or 
else they dare not preach it. While we know the former 
to be extensively true^ we are not without good grounds 
for believing the latter is also largely true. Well they 
know the people will not consent to listen to it. So 
manifestly antagonistic is it to the great central truth 
of the gospel, " God is love/^ so at war with all reas- 
onable conceptions of the Divine character, a minis- 
ter of the gospel could hardly more readily and 
effectually scatter his flock than by frequently preach- 
ing hell torments as preached a few years ago. So 
those of our self-termed evangelical preachers who be- 
lieve the doctrine, are like certain chief priests and 
elders whom our Lord encountered at Jerusalem— they 
" fear the people/^ and so permit the whole subject of 
"future retribution^^ to ^^fall out of notice.^^ 

What we have on another occasion said on this point 
we now repeat: Brethren of the Methodist and all other 
churches, who hold to the torment theory, if you believe 
the doctrine you oiiglit to preacli it ; if you do not 
believe it you ouglit to renounce it. You cannot refuse to 
do either without incurring divine displeasure. As 
Christian brethren, we exhort you to faithfulness in 
this matter. What sort of watchmen are you on the 
walls of Zion ? How can you, day after day, go to God 
in prayer, asking forgiveness while ever renewedly 
guilty of that awful sin of omission, which sarely rests 
upon you, if, believing some of your fellow-men are 
daily, hourly passing into everlasting torture, you fail to 
constantly raise the warning voice? How can you 
stand before your people and, believing them exposed 
to such a future, fail to urge it upon their considera- 



REYIETV OF "REV. ^q". D. GEORGE." 235 

tion more earnestly and persistently than all things 
else combined ? You may say they already know it. 
"We reply, ordinary minds cannot comprehend it, and 
your superior abilities in that direction are constantly 
required to assist them. 

If on the other hand you do not believe it, you surely 
must regard it a gross misrepresentation of the charac- 
er of God, in which case how can you, in the name 
of him who in boundless loye was given, invoke Divine 
favor while before the world you countenance and 
support the libel? In either case your error is not 
simply error; it is a deep, dark sin. Therefore look 
well to your duty in this thing. 

The fact is, as a restrainer from evil the doctrine 
is an ignominious failure. Though it has for centuries 
been preached in various forms and degrees, much of 
the time in its most horrible form, the world is to-day 
worse- than ever. So contemptuous is it of everything 
like true Christian religion; so mad and reckless its 
course of folly and sin ; so many and diabolical its 
crimes, even the ungodly themselves stand aghast, 
wondering what will next develope. In view of these 
facts, that is strange logic which involves the conclusion 
that its eflfects upon the world are salutary, especially, 
as we have seen, it has been found to be so unsalutary 
that it has, so far as preaching it is concerned, " been 
permitted to fall out of notice." 

Eminently salutary is it? Go to every prison- 
house and visit every drunkard, gambler, forger, robber, 
seducer, murderer; nay, traverse our beautiful land 
from centre to circumference, finding out every vil- 
lain of everv kind and grade, whipped and un 



226 



ITAX i^yOT IMjIOETAL. 



whipped of justice, and when you have asked every one 
the question you will have learned that nearly all are 
believers not only in the doctrine of the immortality 
of the soul, but also in the torment theory. Where, 
then, is its boasted power to restrain men from the 
commission of evil? Ask the thousands of weak, 
emaciated, heart-broken wives and mothers who are 
compelled to toil night and day, through sickness and 
health, to keep gaunt starvation from laying its rude 
hand upon their puny and half-naked little ones, and who 
not unfrequently at last, with them, fall victims to mur- 
derous attacks by infuriated demons who pass for hus- 
bands, as they reel home from midnight carousal?, 
crazed by infernal poisons, the trafHc in which is legal 
ized and protected by the laws of Christian land),!. 
And then, if still you doubt, go ask the "300,000 
members,^^ which, a competent and reliable authority 
declares, the churches of the United Kingdom have lost 
by the vice of intemperance during the past three years. 
The astounding wickedness, probably never so great as 
now, throughout a2l Christendom, is an overwhelming 
reply to the assumption that the doctrine is salutary. 

The majority of people, perhaps, make no attempt 
to comprehend or believe the doctrine of eternal tor- 
ments, and upon their ears its presentation falls as so 
many meaningless words. Those who are seriously af- 
fected by it may be divided into two classts, first: they 
who perceive the inexpressible cruelty and vindictive- 
ness it inTputes to the Creator, and, not knowing the 
Bible does not teach it, reject both it and the Bible, 
and plunge into the dark sea of infidelity; and second: 
they who by it are frightened into a profession of re- 



EEVIEW OF '*EEV. D. GEORGE." 227 

ligion. In its influence upon very many of this latter 
class^ is seen some of the most deplorable effects of 
teaching the doctrine. When men have been frightened 
into the form of serving Christy they soon begin to 
contemplate with some degree of calmness their new 
experience. They cannot then fully believe God will 
inflict such objectless punishment upon His creatures, 
and so, their fears becoming allayed, they turn their 
backs upon the Church and again go to the world, 
plunging the more deeply into its follies from having, 
as they suppose, tried religion and found it a bauble. 

People are denounced as infidels for merely denying 
the immortality of the soul, notwithstanding no salu- 
tary quality can be claimed for belief in it except as it 
is associated with future misery ; and the only salutary 
quality that can be claimed for that consists in its 
power of appeal to the passion of fear — fear of suffering. 
A mere abject, slavish submission may be compelled 
on the part of some individuals, by appealing to the 
passion of fear, but willing, hearty obedience can only 
be secured through the influence of love. Cowardly 
people are sometimes frightened into cold conformity to 
divine requirements: but if, when the excitement of 
mind is allayed, they do not return, like the sow to 
her wallowing in the mire,^^ to that course from which 
their love was never really withdrawn, it is because 
some favoring circumstances enable them to look through 
the dark, repulsive cloud in which fear has enveloped 
them, and to see beyond it some beauty in the Lord 
that they should desire him. We hold it axiomatic 
that fear of torment is not a worthy motive to obedience. 
It incites no love, and a religion without love is lifeless. 



228 



MA^ KOT IMMOETAL. 



Love and fear are directly opposite in tlieir effects. 
The former always attracts, the latter always repels. 
So, as God :is love, no doctrine in which His goodness 
is not incorporated can have any connection with the 
gospel message, for that is all glad tidings, good news. 
Love is an affection of the mind^ excited by worth of 
any kind^ or by those qualities of an object which com- 
municate pleasure. Thus love to God is awakened by 
just views of His attributes, or recognition of the ex- 
cellencies of His character. He, by revelation, brings 
these within the scope of our comprehension, and 
teaches us to know ourselves, that, finding our need of 
redemption, we may no longer trust in ourselves, but 
lay hold on the hope which He has set before us in 
the gospel. 

Hence, effectual and successful preaching consists 
in showing men, from the inspired word, what they 
are, what their nature, whither inevitably tending, 
and the means of escape. Informed in these particu- 
lars, and their false hopes dissipated, they will bow to 
the will of God, gladly accept the offer extended in 
illimitable love, fly to him who hath become the 
" author of eternal salvation to all that believe, and 
at his hand drink of the sweet waters of life which 
flow from the boundless ocean of infinite mercy. If 
the truths of the gospel are preached, they will carry 
with them conviction of the excellencies of Divine at- 
tributes, and -excite in the mind of hearers a love to- 
ward God strong enough to draw them to the throne 
of grace. He who repents simply or mainly through 
fear of suffering, is ready to recant whenever that fear 
is removed or quieted, and to withdraw the little love to 



REVIEW OF ^^REY. iT. D. GEORGE." 



229 



God which some noble considerations may haye kin- 
dled within him. 

Since the doctrine of eyerlastiDg torture, or, to 
state it more mildly, of eternal unhappiness, has proved 
a wretched failure, it is shallow to talk about the de- 
struction of the wicked being a dangerous doctrine, 
and any attempt to show it so by childlike assump- 
tions is too frivolous and unreasonable for notice, and 
must be regarded by all well balanced minds as shere 
folly. 

Being so terrible, the torment theory has over- 
reached its mark. Prof. Hudson has well said : That 
which is too fearful, is unfeared. Very few, if any, 
really apprehend that they may live in anguish for- 
ever. Hence there is, if all are immortal, a natural hope 
of final mercy and salvation ; which renders the doc-, 
trine supposed to be so fearful and safe, a dead letter 
and an opiate.'^ As we have before intimated, the 
mind cannot apprehend the idea of endless torture 
sufficiently to believe it. Dr. D wight, Congregationalist, 
savs : 

"There are, I know, persons who speak concern- 
ing future punishment wdth an air of cool self-com- 
placency, as being, in their yiew, epsy of investigation 
and free from embarrassment. I am inclined, perhaps 
uncharitably, to give them little credit for candor, 
clearness of intellect, or soundness of character; and 
greatly doubt whether it has been investigated by 
them.'' 

Bishop Is"ewton remarks : 

"Nothing can be more contrary to the divine nature 
and attributes than for a God all-wise, all-powerful, all- 
good, all-perfect, to bestow existence on any beings 



230 



MAISr jSTOT im^ioetal. 



whose destiny lie foresees and foreknows must termin- 
ate in Y/retchedness and misery, v/itliout recovery or 
remedy, without respite or end. . . . G-od is love; and 
he would rather have not given life, than render that 
life a torment and a curse to all eternity* Imagine 
creatures delivered over to the torments of endless ages 
without the least hope or possibility of redemption. 
Imagine it you may, but you can never seriously lelieve 
it, nor reconcile it tvitli God and goodness^ — Disserta- 
tion on " Final Condition of ManP London edition, 
1787. 

Dr. Edward Beecher has truly said of the orthodox 
theory of punishment: 

^^It involves G-od, his whole administration, and 
his eternal kingdom, in the deepest dishonor that the 
mind of man or angel can conceive. The human mind 
cannot be held back from abhorring such a theory, ex- 
cept by the most unnatural violence to its divinely-in- 
spired convictions of right and honor.^^ — Conflict of 
Ages. 

And where is to be found relief from this gloomy 
theory ? We have clearly shown that revelation affords 
it. "The soul that sinneth it shall die "All the 
wicked will" God ''destroy!^ A writer has aptly 
said : " The destruction of the wicked is not an impos- 
sible process, or offensive to our ideas of equity. Is it 
not infinitely preferable, if we decide by our moral in- 
stincts, that the wicked should expire all their misera- 
ble breath into the night, when the sunset of hope 
arrives, than that they should be kept in bitter and 
everlasting woe aud sin?^^ "The wages of sin is 
death/' a death which, as says Dr. '^h.^diOn, hnotvs 
no resurrection. 

That the extirction of the wicked is a" dangerous 



BEYIEW OF "TtEY. D. GEOr.GE." 



231 



doctrine is a strange cry for those to set up who 
have "permitted the "doctrine of future retribution 
to "fall out of notice; so much so that a Universalist 
might be a constant hearer in almost any of our," so 
called, orthodox "churches, and seldom hear his no- 
tions interfered with from the pulpit." "We are re- 
minded by it of the policy pursued by the Scribes and 
Pharisees whom Jesus denounced, saying to them, 
"Ye neither go in yourselves, neither suffer ye them 
that are entering to go in." Having learned that it 
is at war with Scripture teaching, they do not preach 
their own doctrine concerning the destiny of the wicked, 
thus virtually acknowledging it to be false ; and yet 
they denounce those who do preach and insist on 
preaching a doctrine of retribution that is not only in 
perfect harmony with the revealed attributes of God, hut 
also plainly taught in the Bible. A truly unenviable, 
position is theirs. 

The gospel message is love ; and the religion of the 
Bible is love. But one characteristic of this religion 
of fear is that it supplants the religion of love. Evi- 
dence of this is afforded by the remark, similar to what 
we have already quoted, not unfrequently made by 
Christian people, "If I believed extinction of being 
to be the sinner's punishment, I would take my ease, 
and make the most of this life." It is most likely 
true that these misrepresent themselves. If they do 
not, then their religion is utterly devoid of love. Our 
blessed Master, " for the joy set before him, endured 
the cross " and despised " the shame." This, not fear 
of torture, should be the incentive to faithfulness v>^ith 
all followers of Jesus. Infinite love has revealed life 



232 



and unspeakable joy in store for the righteous. Learn- 
ing this, men loye the Ahnighty Giver, and, enduring 
cross, despising shame, they press toward the mark for 
the prize of the high calling.^^ 

All true Christians love God, and that because He 
first loved them; not because they fear the infliction 
of suffering. God is love; and every faithful disciple 
of Jesus will yet rejoice in a time when the voice of 
w^ailing and sorrow will never more be heard, but 
from everywhere will go up ascriptions of glory, 
honor, praise to God and to the Lamb forever and ever. 
Amen. 



CHAPTEE XVI. 

THE DOCTRIXE OE i:n'heeext im:>iortality. 

The doctrine of the immortality of the soul, that 
man possesses in himself the principle of eternal life, 
became so thoroughly seated in the Christian mind as 
to be generally esteemed a self-evident m^atter ; and 
hence any attempt to demonstrate the soundness of the 
proposition was looked upon by most people as an ab- 
solutely needless effort. So as very few even of those 
who judged the subject a proper one for investiga- 
tion, had the boldness to try the doctrine by the only 
true standard of appeal, and then announce the result 
and stand by it, a pretty general ignorance was preserved 
people continuing, by reason of hearing it from earliest 
infancy, to grew up into the belief that they knew they 
were immortal because, first : the Bible is full of the 
doctrine ; second : they could feel it. 



REVIEW OF ^^REY. i^". D. GEORGE." 233 



Almost universally, comparatively speaking, though 
this idea came to be entertained, there have always been 
those who, justly esteeming the y/ord of God the only 
source of light and knowledge respecting a future life, 
have believed, and contended for the truth that man 
is by nature wholly mortal, and can only have a fu- 
ture life upon certain divinely-announced conditions; 
but such ones have usually been regarded as subjects of 
delusion. During the past few years, however, a 
change has come over the spirit of this great human 
dream. In the wise order of Omnipotence the time 
seems to have come when the dogma of inherent im- 
mortality, which came in as a corrupter of the faith of 
the Church, should be cast out, and the Church cleansed 
of the idolatry — -such it may be called — into which it 
has fallen. 

Throughout that awful dark night of apostacy„ 
lasting several centuries, when the so-called Christiar 
Church seems, as such, to have held in its purity scarce- 
ly any part of the faith once delivered unto the saints, 
there w^re, as we have remarked, a few who clung to 
the truth concerning man's hope of a future life, but 
the number has greatly augmented since the rolling 
tide of reformation fairly set in, and now it has many, 
many thousands of faithful adherents throughout the 
various religious organizations, both in this country 
and in Europe. 

We have shown that those Scripture texts that are 
relied on by many to prove the doctrine of divine ori- 
gin do not teach it: now let us see what some of those 
called orthodox say concerning the question as to 
whether it is taught in the Bible. Bishop Watson says : 



234 MAl^ IS^OT IMMOKTAL. 



"I have read volumes on the nature of the soul, but 
I have no scruple in saying I know nothing about it. 
Hoping as I do for eternal life through Jesus Ohrisr, I 
am not disturbed at my inability to clearly convince 
myself that the soul is or is not a substance distinct 
from the body/^ 

This learned and eminent man desires to hioia 
something about what is termed the immortal soul, 
and having searched the Scriptures thoroughly, having 
read volumes of treatises on the question, and having 
thought deeply on the subject, calling to his aid all his 
rich store of knowledge, frankly admits at last that he 
knows ^'nothing ahotit it ; that he is unable to con- 
vince himself that the soul is or is not a substance dis- 
tinct from the body. Can it be reasonably supposed 
that if the Bible taught the natural immortality of a 
part of man, the essential part, which exists in a state 
of consciousness while the other part is dead, that 
Bishop Watson, thirsting as he did for that very 
knowledge and yearning to possess it, should utterly fail 
of obtaining it ? To assert it is to virtually charge 
him, eminent and learned as he was, with such a lack of 
discrimination, such an inability to comprehend plain 
propositions (for if the doctrine is taught in the Bible 
at all, it surely must be plainly taught) as would rank 
him below ordinary minds. Though we have before 
quoted that other Watson, the great Methodist, we do 
so now, what he says on this point being again in 
place. He remarks : 

Some suppose consciousness is an essential attrib- 
ute of Spirit; and the soul is naturally immortal ; the 
former of which cannot be proved, while the latter is 



REVIEW OF REV. D. GEORGE.'^ 



235 



contradicted ly the BiJjJc, which makes our immor- 
tality a gift dependent on the v/ill of the giver." — In- 
stitutes, vol, a. 

In another part of the same yolume he calls the 
"natural immortality of the soul/^ ^^an absurdity." Be 
it observed that, having closed his investigations of the 
subject, he does not choose to say he knows nothing 
about it, but he goes further and says the doctrine is 
^^contradicted by the Bible." Archbishop "Whately says : 

To the Christian, indeed, all this doubt would be 
instantly removed, if he found that the immortality of 
the soul, as a disembodied spirit, were revealed in the 
word of God. ... In fact, however, no such doctrine is 
revealed to us." 

Strong language that, but no stronger than facts 
justify the use of. Others are equally emphatic on the 
point. Listen to Olshausen. He says: 

" The Bible knov/s not either the expression immor- 
tality of the soul, or the modern doctrine of immortal- 
ity. . . . The doctrine of the immortality of the soul and 
the name are alike unknown in the entire Bible." 

Dr. Proudfit remarks : That best and brightest 
of revelations . . . announces not an immortal soiilj 
but an immiortal manP Bishop Tillotson rather reluct- 
antly, seemingly, admits that ^^the immortality of the 
soul is rather supposed, or taken for granted, than ex- 
pressly revealed in the Bible." Just think of it, dear 
reader ! The Bible gives a minute account of the cre- 
ation of what theologists are pleased to call the ten- 
ement of clay," th^ house which the real man inhabits 
but says nothing about tlie man himself, and, aside 
from raJher su])posing his existence, ignores him alto* 



236 



MAX 1\0T IMMORTAL. 



gether. Is not such a position most palpably unreasoni^ 
able? 'Naj, is it not more than that? And yet there 
are at the present time hundreds^ perhaps thousands^ of 
ministers preaching the doctrine of inherent immortal- 
ity, men who are considered reliable teachers of theology, 
who are compelled to acknowledge that the Bible does 
not teach the immortality of the soul; but say they, it 
assumes it. This is worse than blind leading the blind : 
it may be termed a wilful effort to keep people in ig- 
norance of gospel truth. May our kind and loving 
Father forgive it. 

We might quote from other eminent orthodoxists 
who acknowledge that the Bible does not teach man's 
immortality, but we forbear, adding only our own tes- 
timony. Yf e solemnly assert that inherent immortality 
is not a Scripture doctrine. Since, then, it is not of 
the Bible, when and how did it become 

A DOCTRIXE OF THE CHURCn ? 

In the year 1513 a Council was held under Pope Leo 
X., and during its session the following decree wag 
passed : 

^'"Whereas, some have dared to assert concerning 
the nature of the reasonable soul, that it is mortal; 
we, with the approbation of the sacred council, do con- 
demn and reprobate all those who assert that the intel- 
lectual soul is mortal, seeing that the soul is not only 
truly, and of itself, and essentially the form of the hu- 
man body, as is expressed in the canon of Pope Clem- 
ent the Fifth, but likewise imm.ortcd ; and we strictly 
all from dogmatizing otherwise, and we decree 
that all who adhere to the like erroneous assertions 
shall be shunned and imnished ashereticsP 



REVIEW OF "EEY. J^". D. GEORGE." 237 

From this decree we learn three important facts— 
first: the immortality of the soul did not become a 
ciiiirch doctrine until 1513^ during the pontificate of 
Leo X.; second: that at that time the opposition 
was so strong it was found necessary, in order to 
overcome it, to decree that all who denied the doc- 
trine should be punished as heretics/^ a custom still 
preserved to some extent ; -third : that it was only two 
centuries earlier, during the reign of Clement V., that 
a soul-entity was recognized as a part of the church 
faith. What then becomes of the modern claim that it 
w^as always a doctrine of the Church, a part of the 
Church faith? It seems the Church had not so 
early as the pontificate of Clement V., got so far along 
as to be ready to affirm immortality of the soul, the 
canon of that pontiff only asserting the existence of a 
soul-entity, and that it is "truly, and of itself, and 
essentially the form of the human body." Concern- 
ing the decree of 1513, Luther wrote thus: 

"I permit the Pope to make articles of faith for 
himself and his faithful — such as the soul is the sub- 
stantial ^form of the human body,^ that the soul is 
immortal, with all those monstrous opinions found in 
the Roman dung-hill of decretals." 

Surely no discreet person will read this language 
of the great reformer and then say that Martin Luther 
believed in the immortality of the soul, a doctrine 
which the great body of professing Christians of the 
present time are so jealous of as to make belief in it 
essential to church fellowship. The question may be 
asked, Why, if Luther did not believe the doctrine, do 
we not fiind .more against it in his writings ? Simply 



238 



MAH KOT IMMOIITAL* 



because, doubtless, there existed, in his estimation, more 
glaring evils to combat. But however this may be,it 
is positively certain he would not, if he believed the doc« 
trine, denounce it as one of the monstrous ojnnions 
foitnd ip.the Romcui dungldU of decretals. To one who 
attacked the doctrines of Martin Luther, Yv^illiam Tyn- 
dale, the martyr, replied as follows: 

'^In putting departed souls in heaven, hell, and pur* 
gatory, you destroy the arguments wherewith Christ 
and Paul prove the resurrection. What God doth 
with them, th-at shall we know when we come to them. 
The true faith putteth the resurrection, which we be 
warned to look for every honr. The heathen philos- 
ophers, denying that, did put that souls did ever live. 
And the Pope joineth the spiritual doctrine of Christ 
and the fleshly doctrine of the philosophers together — 
things so contrary that they cannot agree. . . . And 
because the fleshly-minded Pope consenteth unto hea- 
then doctrine, therefore he corrupteth the Scriptures 
to establish it. ... If the souls be in heaven, tell me 
why they be not in as good case as the angels be ? And 
then what cause is there of the resurrection ? " 

These questions neither pope nor priest could an- 
swer; nor has any body ever been able to answer 
them. That they are unansioeralle, is amply attested 
by the wide-spread belie! among professing Christians 
that there will be no resurrection whatever, a belief 
which has been inspired in the Church by and only 
by the doctrine of inherent immotality. The Pope, says 
Tyndale, "joineth the spiritual doctrine of Christ^* 
(resurrection from the dead for such as comply with 
gospel conditions) *^and the fleshly doctrine (inher- 
ent immortality, and conciousness in death) of the 



REVIEW OF "HKV. T). GEORGE/^ 330 

"heathen philosophers together — things so contrary 
that they cannot agree." " The fleshly-minded Pope/^ 
he affirms^ ^^consenteth unto heathen doctrine" (the im- 
mortality of the soul) "and therefore he corrnpieth the 
Scriptures to eatablish it." How did Pope Leo X. cor- 
rupt the Scriptures to establish the doctrine of the 
immortality of the soul? By getting the Council to 
declare it to be tiue^ a Bible doctrine; strictly inliUjit- 
ing all from dogmatizing otherwise, and decreeing 
that all who denied it should be slmnned ^ii^ 2^ un- 
i^lied as heretics. Such arguments are apt to carry 
conyiction. How preposterous in ns to deny the doc- 
trine^ since a Papal Council has made it a tenet of the 
Bible and Church ! 

But who and what was this man who procured the 
issue of a decree declaring this new church doctrine, 
belief in which is now, as then, assumed to be so neces- 
sary as to be made a test of church fellovfship ? We 
quote from J, Pan ton Ham, who says : 

The pontificate of Leo was an epoch in the history 
of the doctrine of the soul's immortality. It was then 
that the successful effort was made to establish and 
giye permanence to this doctrine ; but it was made by 
a usurper of the right of priyate judgment, and accom- 
plished by an act of sarcedotal despotism. The adyo- 
cates of the doctrine of the soul's immortality need 
to be reminded of this suspicious passage in its his- 
toric progress. The seal of authority was annexed to 
it by a Eoman Pontiff, in the dawn of the sixteenth 
century, a man, the worthy counterpart of England's 
Charles II., fond of fashion and field-sports, and mixing 
up in all the dissipated excesses of the sacred metropolis. 
Such was his extrayagance, that the ^ charge has been 



210 MA^T KOT IMMOr.TAL. 

laid at bis door/ says Eanke, ^ that he ran through the 
wealth of three Pontificates — that of his predecessors, 
from whom he^inherited considerable treasure; his own, 
and that of his successor, to whom he bequeathed a 
mass of debt.' ... ^ At court/ proceeds Eanke, ' they 
spoke of the institutions of the Catholic church, and 
of passages in the Holy Scriptures, only in a tone of 
jesting ; the mysteries of faith were held in derision.' 

"Such was Pope Leo the Tenth, and such the circle 
of sanctified society of which he w^as the animating 
centre ! Behold, ye asserters of your own inherent 
immortality, the worthy ^nursing father^ of your faith ! 
the hero of a 'hey-day heterodoxy! the jolly jester with 
the solemn sanctities of Scripture ! the mocker of the 
sacred mysteries ! 

" Worthy patron of a Pagan progeny ! Let it be 
registered as the genuine genealogy of a fundamental 
doctrine of modern British Christendom, that the Pa- 
gan Plato was its father, and the profligate Pope Leo 
its foster father. Born and bred by the Pagan philos- 
phy, and the protege of Popery, this notion of the 
soul's immortality has become a pet dogma of Popular 
Protestantism, w^hich with a strange forgctfulness of 
its low lineage, openly declares it to be the honorable 
offspring of true orthodoxy.'^ 

Yes, such was the man who corrupted the Scrip- 
tures to establish a heathen doctrine. Well indeed 
might advocates of the soul's immortality consider 
" this suspicious passage in its historic progress.'^ The 
theory seems to have been introduced into the 
Church in the second century, and in the third it had 
begun to gain mxany supporters. Circumstances jus- 
tify the conclusion that just in proportion as the faith 
of the Church became corrupted and its yital godliness 
lost, did the belief spread until the reign of Clement V 



REVIEW OF "EEY. iq". D. GEORGE." 241 

(1305), when, for reasons which will ^ presently appear, 
the existence of a soul-entity was declared (not yet 
its immortality; the church, corrupt as it had become, 
was not yet ready for that). Although inherent immor- 
tality was then very widely believed, it was evidently 
deemed unnecessary, perhaps unsafe to attempt to 
make a canon of any thing more than the existence of a 
soiil-eiitity. 

So early as the 9 th century the synodal courts au- 
thorized or consented that the ecclesiastical penance 
should be discharged by the payment of alms,- of 
which the Church was to be the dispenser. At the 
time of the crusades, taking the cross was particularly 
recommended as a substitute for the ecclesiastical pen- 
alties, and at the assembly of Clermont (1095), Urban 11. 
granted a plenary indulgence to those who should join 
the crusade. Thus seems to have been instituted 
what became the doctrine of indulgences, but it was 
not until much later that it became a system. In the 
13th century it was systematically developed by Alex- 
ander of Hales and Thomas Aquinas. 

The doctrine, as thus systematized, was, briefly 
stated, that all the good works of the saints over and 
above what was required for the satisfaction of their 
own sins, are, together with the infinite merits of 
Christ, deposited, so to speak, in one grand receptacle 
or treasury, the keys of which are committed to the 
Pope. In granting an indulgence, a portion of this 
superabundant merit is transferred to particular per- 
sons by the Pope, and is used by them in satisfaction of 
divine justice. 

These indulgences were only to be had for a consid- 



243 



MAK KOT IMMOETAL. 



eration, generally the payment of money, not nn- 
frequently of large amounts ; and an immense income 
to the Church was thereby secured. Of course it thus 
became an object with the Church to increase this 
reyenue, and as comparatively few, perhaps none, de- 
sired indulgences, who did not belieye in conscious- 
ness and suffering in death, it was found necessary to do 
something to establish that belief more generally. Hence, 
we are forced to conclude, the soul-entity canon of 
Clement V.; hence also the declaration of the im- 
mortality of that entity, and inMMtion of all denial of 
it under penalty of punishment as heretics, by the 
Council under Leo X. 

If any are disposed to question this let them first 
give due consideration to the fact that about the time 
of Clement V., the traffic in indulgences marvelloiisly 
increased. It was Clement VI. who, a few years later, 
decreed that the festival of the year of jubilee, an occa- 
sion when a vast business in indulgences was trans- 
acted, should be held every 50th instead of every 100th 
year. The interval was afterward reduced by Urban 
VI. (1389) to 33, and still later by Paul 11. (1470) to 35 
years. It is said that during one of these years as 
Miany as two hundred thousand pilgrims were counted 
in Home in a single month. All these brought rich 
offerings, and the treasury was rapidly filled. 

As to Leo X., it was his abandoned use of the indul- 
gence system which did very much toward precipita- 
ting the great reformation movement. Under his Pon- 
tificate indulgences w^ere sold for sins to be committed. 
Illustrative of the excess to which matters were 
carried, is the following circumstance in the experience 



REVrEW OF "EEV. D. GEORGE." 



243 



of Tetzel, the infamous tool of Leo. A Saxon, haying 
bargained for thirty crowns, for permission to commit 
an act of yiolence, took out the worth of his money 
upon Tetzel himselfo He way-laid that functionary, 
and, having beaten him grievously, carried off the 
chest which contained the very money he had paid. 
He was brought to trial, but upon exhibiting his in- 
dulgence,^^ he was acquitted. Speaking of the condition 
of the Eomish church at about this time, a historian 
says : 

"Eome inwardly laughed at Christendom around 
her, while she showed her spell to be of such a nature, 
that to break it, needed another might than that of 
emperors, kings, bishops, and doctors, with all the sci- 
ence and all the power of the age and the Church. . . . 
The philosophers of Alexandria had spoken of a fire 
wherein men ought to be purified ; and now Eome set 
forth this as a doctrine of the Church : adding, that in- 
dulgences could deliver souls from this intermediate 
state, in which otherwise their sins would detain 
them, Nothing was omitted that could inspire fire. 
Man is prompted by his own nature to dread an un- 
known future; and this dread was worked upon and 
augmented. Who, then, could withold the price of a 
ransom ? So the revolting trade went on. Pope after 
Pope finding new mxCthods of increasing it. . . . Thus 
the clergy had disgraced both religion and themselves. 
Well might Luther exclaim, ' The ecclesiastical state is 
opposed to God and his glory. . . . Every man feels 
disgust when he hears of an ecclesiastic. The evil 
had spread through all ranks: corruption of manners 
kept pace with corruption of faith, and a mystery of 
iniquity lay like an incubus on the enslaved Church 
of Christ. The vital doctrines of the Scriptures had 
nearly disappeared. The strength of the Church had 



244 



IsLAl^ KOT IMMORTAL. 



been wasted : and its body lay stretched upon that part 
of the earth which the Eoman empire had occupied^ 
enfeebled, exhausted, and all but lifeless." — D'AuUgne's 
Reformation, 

Such is the testimony of an eminent scholar, histor- 
ian, and Protestant theologian. So at last we have it 
all. Summed up in few words it stands thus : ISfo im- 
mortal sold doctrine^ no purgatory nor hell torments ; 
and hence no income from the sale of indulgences; no 
enormous revenue from the pretence of praying souls 
out of the fire ; no " Peter's pence," no nothing but 
financial poverty and leanness. What a withering 
rebuke is all this to them who arrogantly denounce as 
little, if any, better than infidels, all such as deny the 
inherent immortality and torment doctrine. The same 
objections that are now urged against the doctrine of 
man's mortality, and unconsciousness in death, were 
then advanced. More asked : 

"What shall he care how long he live in sin, that 
believetli Luther, that he shall after this life feel neith- 
er good nor evil in body nor soul, until the day of 
doom ? " 

To this Tyndale replied : 

"Christ and his apostles taught no other, but 
warned to look for Christ's coming again every hour; 
which coming again, lecaiisG ye lelieve will never de, 
therefore have ye feigned that other merchandizeP 

As was it in the 16th century, so now most of those 
religionists who hold to man's immortality, virtually 
deny the second coming of Christ, a very large and, 
we fear, rapidly increasing class denying it absolutely^ 
Denying those plainest of all Scripture truths, the 



REVIEW OF "EEV. IST. D. GEORGE.'^ 245 

return of Christ and liis reign on the earth, they 
feign "that other merchandize, inherent immortality 
and consciousness in death. As showing the tendency 
of belief in this popular doctrine to lead to denial of 
plain Scripture truth; and also as evidencing that we 
are justified in aflBrming it is not a Bible but a heath- 
en doctrine, we quote the foUowins; from an orthodox 
writer : 

" We would express our conviction that the idea 
of the immortality of the soul has no source in the 
Gospel ; that it comes, on the contrary, from the Pla- 
tonists, and that it was just when the coming of Christ 
was denied in the church, or at least began to be lost 
sight of, that the doctrine of the immortality of the 
soul came into replace that of tlie resurrection. ... It 
is hardly needful to say that w^ do not doubt the im- 
mortality of the soul; we only assert that this doc- 
trine has taken the place of the doctrine of the 
church, as the epoch of its joy and glory.'^ 

Who is not made sad at seeing such words from the 
pen of a Christian writer ? Without daring to deny 
that the resurrection is a Bible doctrine, it is in one 
sentence admitted that the immortality of the soul is a 
Platonic doctrine, and in another it is asserted that 
that heathen idea "has taken the place of the doctrine 
(resurrection) of the church, as the epoch of its 
joy and glory. Let them appreciate such language 
who can : and let them appreciate such sentiments 
who are very ignorant concerning gospel truth; for 
such only ca7i do so. 

Nothing more need be said on this point, so manifest 
is it how and why the immortality of the soul became 



246 



MAK KOT IMMORTAL. 



a Church doctrine. Having seen that Pope Leo X. 
was its foster father ; and that it came as a Platonic 
theory into the Church in the second century, we will 
now examine more fully concerning its source, yiz. : 

HEATHEK PHILOSOPHY. 

That the Egyptians were the first who taught 
the immortality of the soul, most historical writers and 
scholars who have given particular attention to the 
subject are agreed. An eminent scholar of our time, 
and a believer in the doctrine, says : The Egyptians 
were the people of the earliest historical civilization, 
and they were the first to affirm the immortality of the 
soul." Howitt, the historian, speaking of the disper- 
sion at the time of tlie building of the tower of Babel, 
remarks : 

" But before they were thus scattered they corrupted 
the religious doctrines they received from their great 
progenitor, Noah ; or rather had them set aside in order 
to deify Noah and his three sons, whom they had 
come to regard as a reappearance of Adam, Cain, 
Abel, and Seth. The singular coincidence of circum- 
stances between Adam and Noah forced this upon 
their imagination. Adam the first man and father 
of the first world, and Noah the first man and father 
of the second world, had each three sons conspicuous 
in history; and of these three, one in each case was a 
bad one : Cain and Ham. Led by this to consider the 
second family but an avatar" (descent of a deity in a 
visible iorm or incarnation) ^^of the first family, 
they regarded them as immortal and worshipped 
them. From hence we have in all Pagan mythologies 
a triad of principal God's ; one of whom is in each case, 
in a deity of a dark nature, like Cain and HamP 



REVIEW OF "REV. i^". D. GEORGE." 247 

Herodotus, a very ancient historian, says of the 
Egyptians : 

" They are the first of manhind who have defended 
the immortality of the souL They believe that on the 
dissolution of the body, the soul immediately enters 
some other animal, and that after using as vehicles 
every species of terrestrial, aquatic, and winged creat- 
ures, it finally enters a second time a human body. 
They aflSrm that it undergoes all these changes in the 
space of three thousand years. This opinion some 
among the Greeks have adopted as their own.'^ 

Bunsen says : 

" The Egyptians were the first who taught the doc- 
trine of the immortality of the soul — a fact mentioned 
by all Greek writers from Herodotus to Aristotle.'' 

As no Old Testament writer or prophet makes 
any mention of or intimates belief in the doctrine of 
inherent immortality, the question presents itsdf, 
" How came it to pass that the heathen knew of it be- 
fore God's chosen people, they to whom He revealed 
himself? This is a question not easily answered upon 
the assumption that the doctrine is of divine origin. 
Will any reasonable person undertake to say there is 
any probability whatever that God enlightened the 
Egyptians concerning this important matter (if true 
it is very important) and left the children of Israel in 
darkness? None would be so thoughtless or unreas- 
onable as to assert it. 

It is claimed by many theorists, theologists in particu- 
lar, that the doctrine was held in a "base form" by 
the Egyptians. That the Egyptians, or heathen gen- 



248 



MAisT KOT IMXOETAL. 



erally held it in a base form is certainly a bold as- 
sumption, and, we think, an unwarranted one, for it 
may properly be considered a real question whether 
the doctrine of inherent immortality as now held is not 
more base and inconsistent than as held by many 
heathen. While the arguments that are now offered in 
proof of the existence of deathless entities in human 
beings prove equally the existence of such entities in 
brute animals, the doctrine as now held denies im- 
mortality to them, whereas heathen philosophy ac- 
corded it. Eichard Watson, haying claimed that 
" the presence of an immaterial soul with the body is 
the source of animal life," says : 

"It is granted that, on the premises laid down, 
not only must an immaterial principle be allowed to 
man, but to all animals possessed of volition; and 
few, perhaps none, are found without tliis property. . . . 
It does not however follow that they are immortal^ be- 
cause they are immaterial. The truth is, that God 
only hath independent immortality, because He only 
is self-existent, and neither human nor brute souls are 
of necessity immortal.'^ — Institute^ Part 2. 

Bishop Warburton says : 

" I think it may be strictly demonstrated that man 
has an immaterial soul; but then the same arguments 
which prove tliatj prove likewise that the souls of all 
living animals are immortal." 

Not a few other deep thinkers have arrived at con- 
clusions in this matter similar to those of Watson and 
Warburton. Isaac Taylor says : 

" As to the pretended demonstrations of immor- 
tality drawn from the assumed simplicity and indestruc- 
tibility of t^e soul as an immaterial substance, they 



REVIEW OF "KEY. K. D. GEORGE " 



249 



appear altogether inconclusive^ or if conclusive, then 
such as must be admitted to apply with scarcely di- 
minished force to all sentient orders ; and it must be 
granted that whatever lias felt, and has acted spontane- 
ously, must live again and forever 

And why should not the same arguments v/hich 
are supposed to prove that man has an immaterial entity 
within him, prove that inferior animals are also thus 
endowed ? Does the presence of animal life afford 
proof? They have it. Does consciousness? They 
possess it. Does mind ? That phenomena is exhibi- 
ted in them. Does reason ? They are endowed with 
that faculty. Is this denied ? Surely not ^)y any one 
who has taken any interest in the subject. Notwith- 
standing the wolfs keen appetite for flesh, it is only 
after serving a long apprenticeship that he becomes a 
good hunter. Young swallows, who have never effect- 
ed a migration, are trained by repeated evolutions 
performed in troops. After they have become suffici- 
ently experienced in their trial trips, the whole army 
takes its flight under the guidance of experienced lead- 
ers. The bird of prey teaches its young ones to launch 
out into the air, to liover, and to measure the distance 
at which, a victim is to be struck. James Hogg, better 
known as the Ettrick Shepherd, a Scottish writer, 
has said of one of his dogs : 

'^He had never turned sheep in his life; but as 
soon as he discovered that it was his duty to do so, 
and that it obliged me, I can never forget with what 
anxiety and eagerness he learned his different evolutions; 
he would try every way, deliberately, till he found out 
what I wanted Him to do ; and when once I made him 
understand a direction, he never mistook or forgot it. 



250 



MA^^ KOT IZrlMORTAL. 



Well as I knew him, he often astonished me, for when 
hard pressed, in accomplishing the task which Y/as set 
him, he had expedients of the moment, that bespoke 
a great share of the reasoning faculty 

Evidences of the exercise of reasoning faculties, by 
brnte animals, are so numerous it seems almost a 
waste of time to note any particular ones. John 
Locke says: "Birds learning of tunes, and the en- 
deavors some may observe in them to hit the notes 
right, put it past doubt with me that they have 
perception, and retain ideas in their memories and %ise 
them for idatternsP 

"The possession of this kind of intelligence and 
reasoning power, is not confined to the human species* 
We have already seen that there are many instinctive 
actions in man as well as in animals. It is no less true 
that, in the higher animals, there is often the same exer- 
cise of reasoning ])Ower as in man. The degree of this 
power is much less in them than in him, but its na^ 
ture is the same. Whenever, in an animal, we see any 
action performed, with the evident intention of ac- 
complishing a particular object, such an action is 
plainly the result of reasoning power, not essentially 
different from our own. . . . 

"The teachibility of many animals, and their ca- 
pacity of forming new habits, or improving the old 
ones, are instances of the same kind of intellectual 
power, and are quite different from instinct, strictly 
speaking. It is this faculty which especially predom- 
inates over the other in the higher classes of animals, 
and which finally attains its maximum of develop- 
ment in the human species.^^ — Dalton, in Treatise on 
Human Physiology, 

None, we think, will deny that lower animals are 



REVIEW OF "KEY. IsT. D. GEORGE." 251 

possessed of reasoning faculties. The quality of mind, 
or larger reasoning capacity cannot be justly regarded 
as evidencing the existence of an immaterial entity in 
man, and not in other animals, for some of the lower 
types of the human species rank quite as low, if not 
lower in the scale of intelligence than some of the 
higher types of the brute. As, then, the Egyptians, 
like many other heathen, did hold that the lower 
animals are possessed of a soul-entity, Warburton^ 
Watson, and others must be considered as testifying 
that the doctrine as held by the heathen was more con- 
sistent in some respects, at least, than as now held. 
Since belief in the immortality of the soul is held by so 
many to be an essential item of faith, we should, if 
any weight is to attach to the claim, expect to find 
the Egyptians, the originators of the doctrine, giving 
evidence of its power. "We certainly shall not just here 
deny that they did afford such evidence abundantly, 
and if so then the general character of that people 
will determine somewhat the tendency of belief in the 
doctrine. Let us see what was their character. Tytler, 
the historian, speaking of Egyptian superstition, says : 

" The same animals that were regarded, in one pro- 
vince, with the most superstitious reverence, were, in 
another, the objects of detestation and abhorrence. In 
one quarter they tamed the crocodiles, adorned them 
with gold and jewels, and worshipped them ; in an- 
other they killed those animals without mercy. In 
one province the most sacred animal was a dog; in 
another they reckoned dog's flesh as the most delicate 
food. Cats were adorned in one district, and rats 
in another, Erom these differences arose perpetual 
and violent animosities ; for there are no contentions so 



252 



UA^ XOT IMMOETAL. 



rancorous as those which spring from the most trifling 
ditferences in religious worship or opinion. ' The 
multiude/ says Diodorus, 'have been often inflamed 
into the highest pitch of fury, on account of the sacri- 
legious murder of a divine catJ 

" The extravagant length to which the Egyptians 
carried their veneration for their consecrated animals 
exceeds all belief. The sacred crocodile, the dog, or 
the cat were kept in an inclosed space set apart ad- 
joining to the temples dedicated to their worship. 
They were constantly attended by men of the high- 
est rank, whose business was to provide them with the 
choicest victuals, which they were at pains to dress m 
the manner they supposed most agreeable to their pal- 
ate. They washed them in warm baths, and anointed 
them with the richest perfumes. The finest carpets 
were spread for them to lie on; chains of gold and 
circlets of precious stones were hung around their 
legs and necks; and when the stupid animal, insensi- 
ble of the honors that were bestowed on him, died, like 
the rest of his kind, the whole province was filled 
with lamentation; and not only the fortunes of the 
priests, but the public revenue was without scruple ex- 
pended in the performance of the most sumptuous 
funeral obsequies. 

" It is not then to be wondered at that the super- 
stitions of the Egyptians were a copious subject of ri- 
dicule to other nations of antiquity, and contributed 
to degrade them in the opinion of those whose ob- 
jects of religious worship, if not fundamentally more 
rational, were less ludicrous, less childish and unman- 
ly. What could they think of a nation where, as 
Herodotus tells us, if a house was on fire, the father of 
a family would tak3 more pains to save his cats than his 
wife and children ? where a mother would be trans- 
ported with joy at the news of her child being devoured 
by a crocodile ; or where the soldiers, returning from 



KEYIEW OF ^^EEY. IST. D. GEOP.GE." 253 

a military expedition, would come home loaded with 
a precious booty of dogs, cats, hawks, and yultures? 

"The general character of the Egyptians, with re- 
spect to morals, contributed likewise to draw upon 
them the disesteem of other nations. They have been 
generally accused by the ancients of great cunning and 
insincerity in their dealings/^ 

Such were they who originated the doctrine ot 
the immortality of the soul. Who will longer claim 
that belief in it tends to restrain men from the com- 
mission of eyi], or incite them to acts of goodness? 
It has been asserted that the Egyptians " seemed to 
think that the chief end of man was to be buried well, 
and with them masonry and embalment were the chief 
arts in request.'^ That this is true is, we think, gen- 
erally conceded. And what does it show? Why, that 
notwithstanding their speculations about their real life 
inhering in something witliin them, they considered 
the outward, the visible self the most worthy object 
of attention. It strongly indicates, too, that they did 
not fully believe what they professed, an example fol- 
lowed by many of their heathen disciples of other na- 
tions, and by not a few in the present day respect- 
ing certain views attendant upon belief of the doctrine 
of man^s immortality. It may not be a pleasant re« 
flection for some, nor flattering to their pride, but it 
is well for all to remember that the idea of inherent 
immortality was not revealed to the Hebrews, but was 
conceiyed by a people who worshipped cats, dogs, 
crocodiles, etc. ; a people whose general character, with 
respect to morals, drew " upon them the disesteem of 
other nations." 



254 



MAX NOT IMMOilTAL, 



Of the Greeks, Pythagoras stands prominent as a 
teacher of the doctrine. He became a Eoman citizen- 
He flourished about 520 b. c. Like the Egyptians, he 
particularly taught the transmigration of souls. He it 
was of whom Xenophanes, his contemporary, relates^ 
that, seeing a dog beaten, and hearing him howl, 
begged the striker to desist, adding, ' It is the soul of 
a friend of mine, whom I recognize by his voice.'" 
Could the deceased friend have heard the remark, he 
would most likely have regarded such a reference to 
his voice as any thing but complimentary. That hu- 
man souls should inhabit dogs, and instead of uttering 
words of wisdom, become howling brutes, may be 
thought very base, as it surely is, but it is not so base as 
that souls should inhabit tables, writing-desks, and 
other senseless things : nor is the howling of a dog 
much more unlike the sweetest sounds of the human 
voice than is very much of the trash which reaches 
the world through the medium of tables unlike the 
living utterances of those to whom it is attributed. 

Next comes Socrates, who lived something less than 
a century later than Pythagoras. He did not teach 
transmigration, but he taught some things equally ab- 
surd. It is recorded in history that — 

" This philosopher believed in the Divine origin of 
dreams and omens, and was a supporter of the doctrine 
of the immortality of the soul.'^ 

Socrates wrote no books, but Plato wrote his life. 
Plato was the pupil of Socrates, and became thoroughly 
imbued with his philosophy. After the death of Soc- 
rates Plato traveled considerably, remaining, in one 
of his journeys, some time in the Greek cities of 



REVIEW OF "REY. I^". D. GEORGE.'^ 255 

lower Italy, the home of Pythagoreanism. Here he 
seems to have so far departed from the philosophy of 
Socrates as to adopt the Pythagorean doctrine of 
transmigration, which he afterward taught. History in- 
forms us that his "general mode of philosophizing was 
in antiquity regarded as strongly Pythagorean." Then 
came Cicero, an able defender of inherent immortality 
He was less popular than Plato, 

Plato's writings were favorites alike with Pas^an 
and Christian antiquity ; and thus it came about that 
his teachings corrupted the Christian church, as they 
had already corrupted the Hebrew; for the Pharisaic 
belief was truly Pythagorean. True, Paul is ap- 
pealed to for proof that the Pharisees believed in a 
resurrection ; but it is clear that their idea of a resur- 
rection was simply transmigration : and even this 
peculiar sort of resurrection they denied to the no- 
toriously wicked. In Acts xxiii. 8, we read — "For 
the Sadducees say that there is no resurrection, neith- 
er angel nor spirit; but the Pharisees confess both," 
Concerning this Prideaux remarks : 

"The Pharisees confess both: that is, first: there is 
to be resurrection from the dead ; and second : that 
there are angels and spirits. But according to Josephus 
this resurrection of theirs was no more than a Py- 
thagorean resurrection; that is, a resurrection of the 
soul only by transmigration into another body, and 
being born anew with it. But from this resurrection they 
excluded all that were notoriously wicked. ... But 
as to lesser crimes, their opinion was that they were 
punished in the bodies which the souls of those that 
committed them were next sent into," 

The question put to Jesus by the disciples, " Who 



256 



MAK I^OT IMMORTAL. 



did sin, this man or his parents that he was born blind 
shows conclusively that they were not only familiar 
with the doctrine of transmigration but, until better 
taught, believed it. Nothing but an assumption of trans- 
migration of souls could suggest the query whether 
the man himself had sinned, that he should be horn 
blind, for if being lor7i blind was because of Ms own 
Bin, the sin must of course have been committed while 
he pre-existed in another body. 

In the early days of Christianity the church was 
much perplexed by certain Platonic philosophers, known 
as "New Platonic," who, professing to accept the 
Christian religion insisted upon being recognized as 
Christians. In the second century they succeeded in 
this. It seems to hare been thought that as they 
were learned and respected it was best to recognize them. 
From, this time the Platonic theory of inherent im- 
mortality, slightly modified, be2:an to spread in the 
church, and continued gradually to do so until certain 
ecclesiastical dignitaries conceived the idea, as we have 
already shown, of turning it to financial account, 
which idea they utilized by making denial of the 
doctrine punishable as heresy, thus seeking to compel 
belief in it. 

It is a common remark that " belief in the immor-' 
tality of the soul is and has been almost universal." 
"We have clearly shown that this is not now, and has 
not been the case in the Christian church ; and we will 
also show that it is not true of the heathen. Prof. Le- 
land, in his work on " The Advantages and Necessity 
of the Christian Eevelation," says : 



REVIEW OF "EEY. l^". J), GEORGE." 257 

"What that great man, Cicero, says of the philoso- 
phers of his time is remarkable. In that celebrated 
treatise where he sets himself to prove the immortality 
of the soul, he represents the contrary as the ^;reiYu7- 
inff opinion; that there v/ere crowds of opponents, 
not the epicureans only, but, which he could not ac- 
count for, those that were the most learned, had that 
doctrine in contempt," 

Prof. Stewart says: 

"Cicero, incomparably the most able defender of 
the souFs immortality the heathen world can yet boast, 
yery ingenuously confesses, that after all the arguments 
which he had adduced in order to confirm the doctrine 
in question, it so fell out, that his mind was satisfied of 
it only when directly employed in contemplating the 
arguments adduced in its favor. At all other tirnes he 
fell unconsciously into a state of douit and darhnessP 

This admission by Cicero affords a complete refu- 
tation of the claim, often made by believers of the 
doctrine, that people Tcnow they are immortal because 
they are conscious of it, etc. If there were any truth in 
such arguments then all would experience the same 
feeling, which is not the case. Prof. Hudson {Debt and 
Grace) quotes from Socrates as follows: 

" Can the soul, which goes to the presence of a good 
and wise God (whither my soul shall shortly go), can 
this soul of ours, when separated from the body, be im- 
mediately dispersed and destroyed, as most men assert 

It is known that some of the early fathers held to 
the existence of a soul-entity in man, but they believed 
it to be m.ortal, and that the securing of its im- 
mortality depended upon conditions. 

If men will persist in teaching the doctrine of in- 



258 



IMAH KOT IMMORTAL. 



herent immortality, why, let them do it; but since the 
origin of the theory is so obvious, we pfotest, in the 
name of both reason and revelation, against their palm- 
ing it off upon the unsuspecting as a Bible doctrine. 
It has no source intlie gospel," but "comes, on the 
contrary, from the Platonists," and " it was just wlien 
tlie coming of Christ was denied in the Church, or at 
least began to be lost sight of, that " it " came in to 
replace that of the resurrection^ 



REVIEW OF "REV. D. GEOEGE." 259 



CHAPTEE XVII. 

SCRIPTIJIIE MOTIVE TO OBEDIENCE Aiq'D EAITHFUL]jq-ESS. 

For reasons too obvious to require statement, it 
has become a custom, extensively practiced among 
preachers and exhorters holding to the popular faith 
respecting man's nature, to urge meditations on death> 
etc., as a motive to repentance on the part of unbe- 
lievers, and to constancy on the part of believers. 
With reference to the basis upon which this motive 
is made to rest, viz., the expectation of an entrance, 
at death, into a state either of blessedness or woe, we 
have only to say, there is not a single passage of Scrip- 
ture that, reasonably interpreted, warrants such an 
expectation. 

If those portions of holy writ that testify to the 
coming of Christ, as the time for the fruition of Chris- 
tian hopes, were expunged, what promise, or evidence 
of whatever character, could any believer produce that 
would furnish a satisfactory reason for his hope ? We 
know of none. The fulfillment of every promise of a 
future life is made to depend upon the return of our 
Lord from heaven. If he comes not, there can be no 
resurrection; and if there be no resurrection, then even 
^^they which have fallen asleep in Christ are perished,'' 
and so "shall not see light." While, therefore, re- 
ligionists generally,- believing they have arguments 
more effective and precious, so far fail of a proper ap- 



2G0 



MAi^" l^OT IMMORTAL. 



preciation of tliat great central truth in the gospel glad 
tidings which, like its inseparable companion, " God is 
love/' lends vitality and lustre to all others, that, unlike 
our Lord himself, the apostles, and early church gen • 
erally, they wholly neglect to urge it upon the consid 
eration of either sinner or believer, let us inquire 
whether it, instead of death or torment, is not the 
great scriptural motive to obedience and godliness. 

What is set forth in the gospel as the motive to 
repentance^ We answer, the second coming of Christ. 
^^Eepent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins 
may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall 
come from the presence of the Lord ; and he shall send 
Jesus Christ . . . whom the heavens must receive until 
the times of restitution of all things, which God hath 
spoken." — Acts iii. 19, 21. There is no fact connected 
with all the future, a contemplation of which by sin- 
ners is so effective in inducing penitence, as the coming 
of Christ. The most important secret of its power, if 
we except an overwhelming evidence of its nearness, 
in which case multitudes of cowardly drones would 
be frightened into a species of repentance, lies in its 
tendency to lead men to see what they are, and conse- 
quently what they need; for the first inquiry suggested 
to the mind when impressed with that truth is, " What 
is Christ coming to do?^^ When it is seen that his 
first work will be the giving of life and immortality 
to his people, and sealing the doom of eternal death 
upon unbelievers, the inevitable query of each is, 
<^ What relationship do I sustain toward him?'^ When 
the mind reaches this point, the indulgence of a hope 
of final restoration, a sentiment largely prevalent among 



REVIEW OF "REV. D. GEOEGE.'^ 



261 



both believers and unbelievers, is utterly precluded, 
and they are left to deal only with stern, inexorable 
truth. They then realize that life and death are set 
before them, and that it is theirs to choose. 

What is the scriptural motiye to mortification of 
animal Insts? We reply, Christ's second coming. 
"When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall 
we also appear with him in glory. Mortify, therefore, 
your members which are upon the eartlV etc.— Col» 
iii. 4, 5. All who have learned the truth that they have 
not immortality in themselves, but must depend upon 
the coming of Christ to bestow it, are therefore, if not 
grossly inconsistent, especially careful to " mortify 
their "members.'' They sin not against God by unholy 

gratification of sensual appetites, but keep all under 
dominion ; using them only to the glory of God and to 
the honor of Christ. They strive to keep the fleshly 
nature in subjection to the spiritual, and seek things 
pertaining to the kingdom of God, which Jesus will 
establish at his coming. 

What is the scriptural motive to a practice of 
general oleclience and lioUness? We reply, the same. 

For the Son of man shall come in the glory of his 
Father, with his angels, and then shall he reward 
every man according to his works." — Matt. xvi. 27. 
"We know that when he shall appear, we shall be 
like him, for we shall see him as he is. And every man 
that hath this hope in him purifieth himself." — 1 John 
iii. 2, 3. We are not, of course, to understand the 
apostle as intimating that a man may purify himself 
without divine assistance. He is speaking of those 
with whom the coming of Christ is an object of hope. 



2G2 



MAK KOT IMMORTAL. 



Such as truly cherish that hope do purify themselves 
by assiduous application^ and use all the means which a 
merciful and loving God has made available. They 
grow in grace by careful and constant cultivation of 
that " faith' which worketh by love/^ and purifies the 
heart. Contemplating the love of God in Christ Jesus, 
love fills the heart and reaches out and encircles the 
whole human family, brethren in Christ especially. 
And to the exercise of this love the coming of Christ 
is the scriptural motive. "And the Lord make you 
to increase and alound in love toward one another, and 
toward all men, even as we do toward you : to the end 
he may stablish your hearts unblamable in holiness be- 
fore God, even the Father, at the coming of our Lord 
Jesus Christ."—! Thess. iii. 12, 13. 

The coming of Christ is the scriptural motive 
to spiritual-mindedness. "For our conversation is in 
heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, 
the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall change our vile 
body, that it may be fashioned like unto his glorious 
body.''— PhiL iii. 20, 21. 

The same is the motive to deeds of Tcindness and 
mercy, "When the Son of man shall come in his glory 
• . . then shall he say unto them on his right hand, 
Come ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom 
prepared for you. ... I was an hungered, and ye gave 
me meat : I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink . , , 
naked, and ye clothed mo : I was sick,and ye visited 
me . . . inasmuch as ye have done it ujito one of the 

least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.'' 

Matt. XXV. 31-40. 
. It is also the scriptural motive to moderation and 



REVIEW OF ^'KEV. isf. D. GEORGE/^ 



203 



sohriety. "Let your moderation be known unto all 
men. The Lord is at hand/' — PhiL iy. 5. 

So is it also to paiiencQ and long-suffering. " Be ye 
also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of 
the Lord draweth nigh. Grudge not one against an- 
other, brethren, lest ye be condemned: behold, the 
Judge standeth before the door." — James y. 8, 9. 

And, finally, the coming of Christ is the scrip- 
tural motire to w at clif Illness, "Let your loins be girded 
about, and your lights burning; and ye yourselyes like 
unto men that wait for their Lord. . , . Blessed are 
those servants whom the Lord, when he cometh^shall 
find watching." — Luke xii. 35, 37. 

It was not the prospect of deaths popularly regarded 
8S a mere transition in conscious existence, that the 
apostles preached as a motive to repentance and obedi- 
ence. The dogma, incorporated in later theology, of 
entering a state either of happiness or woe at death, 
had no place in their teachings, and for the unex- 
ceptionable reason that Jesus taught it not to them. 
On the contrary, they steadfastly asserted, and dil- 
igently labored to convince all deniers that man is 
wholly mortal; that w^ithout a union Tvith Christ the 
Life-giyer; without receiving the spirit which the 
Father sends in Jesus' name, and yielding obedience 
to its indications to duty, thus developing a character 
in harmony with God, they have no germ of eternal 
life in them, and cannot, therefore, have a deliverance 
from the power of death. They have not received the 
spirit of adoption. They are not begotten of the 
incorruptible seed, and hence cannot have a resurrec- 
tion birth. 



204 



MA^r KOT i:\i:vIORTAL. 



The two great facts in wliich are centered all tlif»- 
hopes inspired in the minds of a perishing race by the 
promises of the gospel^ are the coming of Christ, and 
resurrectioD, or change, if living, of all who are sub- 
jects of an indwelling of the Spirit of him which 
raised up Jesus from the dead/^ To no others has a 
life of happiness been promised ; to none has a future 
life of woe been threatened. No others are cheered by 
the gospel hope, nor made joyful by the accumulating 
evidence that the time hastens when a kingdom shall 
be established whose King shall " rule in righteous- 
ness.'^ 

Those thrilling words of inspiration, "I saw in the 
night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man 
came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Anci- 
ent of days, and they brought him near before him» 
And there was given him dominion, and glory, and : 
a kingdom, that all people, nations, and languages, 
should serve him ; and, " awake and sing, ye that 
dwell in the dust,'' are judged dull and incompetent 
by popular school preachers, in exhorting Christians 
to faithfulness. They haveavfay, instituted, as we have 
seen, by heathen philosophers, more pleasing to the 
creature. The language of the Saviour, " This is the 
will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth 
the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting 
life ; and I will raise him up at the last day," makes 
dull music in the ears of those who have a theory 
which reduces the resurrection to small moment. 
The testimony of the "sure word of prophecy," for, 
behold, the day cometh that shall burn as an oven ; 
and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall 



REVIEW OE "EEV. ^i?". D. GEORGE." 2G5 

be stubble ; and the clay that cometh shall burn them 
lip, saith the Lord of hosts, that it shall leave them 
neither root nor branch;" they shall be punished 
with everlasting destruction from the presence of the 
Lord, and from the glory of his power," is regarded by 
them as rather soothing than otherwise to the ungod- 
ly; so a worse thing, a child of human fancy must 
needs be urged instead. 

0 ye professed exponents of divine law, will you 
not believe God? Must you insist on teaching for 
doctrine the commandments of men? Will you never 
recover from the blindness in j)art" which "has 
happened unto " Christendom ? Be not wise above 
what is written. When God says "unto the wicked, 
0 wicked man, thou shalt surely die," do not insist 
that the tempter's words, " thou shalt not surely die,^^ 
are true. Point unbelievers to the coming of Christ, 
and warn them to be on the Lord's side in that terri- 
ble day. Point believers there, too, as an event which 
must precede the fruition of their hopes. Do you 
say, " The doctrine of Christ's second coming has be- 
come unpopular by reason of the extravagances and 
inconsistencies of some of its supporters ? " We 
grant that reproach has thus been brought upon the 
cause ; but, we ask, what truth has not had inconsist- 
ent supporters? Faithful John Fletcher said on this 
gubject: "I know many have been grossly mistaken as 
to years, but because they were rash, shall we be stu- 
pid? Because they said, ^to-day,' shall we say 
* never,' and cry ^- peace, peace,' when we should look 
about us with eyes full of expectation ? " We would 
that these words of Fletcher's might be written over 



2G6 



MAK ]SrOT IMMOETAL. 



every pulpit in the land^ for perad venture some might « 
be by them spurred to the performance of long neglec- 
ted duty. 

Sir Isaac ISTewton, in his work on the prophe- 
cies, said, there is scarcely a prophecy of the Old 
Testament which does not in something or other relate 
to the second coming of Christ.'^ 

The Avorld ^^'lieth in wickedness," Iniquity is so 
triumphant that they who insist that all mankind will 
be converted to Christ before his return, deplore in 
confusion and dismay its alarming increase, and agon- 
ize over its abounding. It will so continue, and 
change not. " Evil men will wax worse and worse, 
deceiving and being deceived.'^ Beseech the people, 
therefore, and "by the coming of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, and by our gathering together unto him," ex- 
hort them to constancy. Direct them to that event, and 
the attendant reward of saints, as the ever-brightening 
star of gospel hope, and "crown of rejoicing." 

The angelic announcement concerning Jesus was' 
"He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of 
the highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him 
the throne of his father David : and he shall reign 
over the house of Jacob forever ; and of his kingdom 
there shall be no end." — Luke i. 32-33. Let no man 
suppose this prophecy has reference to Chirst's first 
coming merely, for the circumstances of his first ad- 
vent were such that it most assuredly did not meet the 
terms of the announcement. He did not then re- 
receive the throne of his father David, but was cast 
out and put to death. His first comicg was to a 
brief life of humility and grief; but when next he 



REVIEW OF "REV. D. GEORGE." 



2G7 



comes it will be to occupy tlie throne of eternal power 
and great glory. He then ^^'came to his own and his 
own received him not;^^ soon he will come to be wel- 
comed by his tried ones with songs of everlasting tri- 
umph. He was then not seen to possess comeliness 
or beauty that they should desire him ; soon " he shall 
come to be glorified in his saints^, and to be admired 
in all them that believe." 

How truly marvelous is it that religionists should 
allow any thing, much less a heathen doctrine, to ob- 
scure the glorious light of the great truth of Christ's 
second coming. The patriarchs were favored with 
visions of it, and they rejoiced exceedingly. The pro- 
phets prophecied of it, telling its glories in loftiest 
strains. Jesus himself taught it abundantly, and his 
followers, catching up the blessed and sanctifying theme, 
made it the burden of apostolic preaching, and set it 
up as the great bell of liberty, joyfully ringing out the 
birth, of redemption to every child of the living God« 
Heavenly beacon, it has cheered the sufifering sainta 
amid all the angry storms of suffering, and terrible 
tempests of persecution that have howled about them 
and beat upon them. 

Though the signs of the near approach of Christ's 
return are so numerous and clear that universal atten- 
tion should be directed to them and it, all, save a few 
watching ottes, are unmindful of it But this very 
state of things was foretold. "For as in the days 
that were before the flood, they were eating and drink- 
ing, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day 
that Noah entered into the ark, and knew net, until 
the flood came, and took them all away ; so shall 



26S 



also the coming of the Son of man be." — Matt, 
xxiy. 38^ 39. Truly it is now as then. Each one 
chases his favorite phantom, and thinks not of the all- 
important impending event. That the luorld should 
occupy such a position is to be expected; but that 
the (7/n^?TA should be to such an extent unmindful is 
indeed a mournful spectacle. 

Church of the living God! Take warning. Let 
all loins be girt about, and all lamps burning. Stand 
ye all as men ready and waiting to go forth to meet 
our returning Lord. The brightening streams that gild 
the eastern horizon tell us that the long dark night of 
waiting is about to give place to glorious, eternal day. 
Soon will " the Eedeemer come to Zion and then will 
the redeemed come there with songs of everlasting 
joy. "Yet a little while, and he that shall come will 
come, and will not tarry." — Heb, x. 37. "Behold, I 
come quickly : and my reward is with me." — Eev. xxii. 
13. Watch, therefore, ... for in such an hour as ye 
think not, the Son of man cometh." "~ 

" And wlio is He? the vast, the awful form. (Eev. x. 1, 2). 

Girt with the whirlwind, sanclall'd with the storm ! 

A western cloud around his limbs is spread, 

His crown a rainbow, and the sun his head. 

To highest heaven he lifts his kingly hand, 

And treads at once the ocean and the land : 

And hark ! His voice amidst the thunder's roar, 

His dreadful voice, that time shall be no more. 

Lo ! thrones are set, and every saint is there (R^iv. xx. G). 

Earth's utmost bounds confess their awful sway, 

The mountains worship, and the isles obey: 

Nor sun, nor moon they need — nor day, nor ni^ht ; — 

God is their temple, and the Lamb their light. (Rev^ xxi. .22) ; 

And shall not Israel's sons exulting come, 

Hail the glad beam, and claim their ancient home? 



KEYIEW OF ^'REY. D. GEORGE.'^ 



2G9 



On David's throne sliall David's oflspring reign, 

And the dry bones be warm with life again. (Ezek. xxvii). 

Hark; white-robed crowds their deep hosannas raise, 

And the hoarse flood resounds the sound of praise; 

Ten thousand harps attune the mystic song, 

Ten thousand thousand saints the strain prolong I 

Worthy the Lamb, omnipotent to save. 

Who died, who lives triumphant o'er the grave." 



PAGE 271 



INDEX. 



CHAPTEE L 
Introdtjctoby Eemaeks. — The Penalty of 

Penalties always stated in plain terms, 9. — Proportionate to the 
offense, 9. — Divine laws expressed in unmistakable terms, 9, 10. — 
Inconsistency of supposing the Edenic penalty was spiritual death 
or eternal suffering, 10, 11. — Query of John Foster, 11. — Eemarks 
by Dr. John Locke, 12. — Adam understood the penalty to be lit- 
eral death, 12. — Paraphrase, by Lange, of the tempter's language* 
13. — Do., by Adam Clarke, 13. — Nature of the death threatened 
clearly shown, 15-17. — Not spiritual death : Christ did not suffer 
it, 18, 19.— Christ suffered literal death, 20-22.— Eemarks by Ad- 
am Clarke on " dust thou art," etc., 23. — What Bishop Law says 
on the subject, 24, 25. — Inconsistencies exposed, 26, 27. 

CHAPTER IL 
Matt. x. 28 Considered. 

Bible meaning of soul, 31. — Testimony of Dr. Parldiurst, 32. — 
Dr. Adam Clarke on Matt. xvi. 25, 26, 36.— Dr. Lange on the New 
Testament use of " sleep " 37. — What Dr. Hodge says on Eom. 
viii. 11, 37, 38.— Harwood on Matt. x. 28, 39.— Extract from The- 
ologg of Bible^ 39, 40. — Do. from Bible m, Traditiou, 41, 42.— 
Meaning of hell," in the text, 41.— Testimony of Dr. Eichard 
Watson, 50. — Eemarks by Prof Hudson, 50. — Eemarks by Thom- 
as Eead, author of Bible vs. Tradition, 52, 53. 



273 



CHAPTER III. 

Acts xxiy. 15 Considered. 

Quotation from Dr. Alexander, 57. — Do. 59. — Paul and tlie 
Pliarisees, 60-63. — Extract from Theology of the Blble^ 62. 

CHAPTER IV. 

The Pe^jitent Thief. 

Remarks by.Drs. Clarke, Barnes, and Owen, 65. — Paradise 
does not now exist, but will, 68. — When? 68. — Testimony of 
Clarke, 71. — Paradise and the "third heaven" co-existent, 73. 
— Jesus descended into SheoP (hell), 74. — Meaning of Sheol, 
74.— How Tremellius rendered it, 74. — ^Murdock's Syriac transla- 
tion of Acts ii. 31, 32, 78.— What Dr. Lange says, 81.— What 
Whately says, 81. 

CHAPTER V. 

2 Cor. v. 1-9 COXSIDEKED. 

Unjust imputations noticed, 84, 85. — Remarks by Dr. Lange, 
87. — Quotations from an English writer, 88. — Arguments by Arch- 
bishop Whately, 89.— Arguments by Milton, 89, 90.— Arguments 
by Belsham, 91. — The texts as rendered in Lange's Commentary, 
92.— What Dr. Priestly says, 92. 

PART II. 
Stephen's Case Examined (Acts vn. 59. 60), 93. 

PAET III. 

OuTWAiiD Man, and Inwaud Man, (2 Cok. iy.) 

Observations by Lange, 99. — What is the inward man ? 100.— 
What Dr. Clarke- says about it, 101. 

CHAPTER YL 

Paul's Desire to Depart, (Phil, l 20-34.) 

Translation the object of his desire, 105. — Remarks by Belsham, 
106.— Remarks by Dr. Priestly, 106,. 107.— Remarks by Bishop 
Law, 107.— Remarks by Milton, 107.— Remarks by Whately, 108. 



IKDEX. 



373 



PART II. 

In the Body, or Out of the Body, (2 Cor. xii. 2.) 

A dilemma, 113. — Au English writer's way of getting out of it, 
113. — Remarks of Mr. Lee concerning " inspiration," 114. 

PART III. 
John v. 28, 29, 115. 

CHAPTER YII. 
The Transfiguration, (Matt. xyii. 1-3.) 
What Aclam Clarke says, 123.— What Prof. Mattison says, 124. 

PART II. 
"Supposed they had seen a Spirit," 125. 

PART III. 

Luke xx. 37, 38, Examined. 

Arguments of Mr. Landis, 127. — Their fallacies exposed, 12S^ 
120.— Advice of Justyn Martyr, 129.— Testimony of Wm. Tyn- 
dale, 129. — Testimony of Darby, 129. — God's promise to the Pa- 
triarchs, 131. — God's promise to Moses, 131. — The promises not 
yet fulfilled, 132. 

CHAPTER YIIL 
Parable op the rich man and Lazarus (Luke xyi.) 

Parable of the trees, 137.— Parable of the eagles, 138.— What Dr. 
Adam Clarke says of parables in general, 140.— What Whitlysays 
of the parable, 140.— What Lightfoot says, 141.— What Wakefield 
says, 141. — Remarks by Theophylact, 142.— Remarks by Dr. Gill^ 
144 —Remarks by James Bate, M. A. , 145. 

PART II. 

'Dan. xii. 2 considered. 

Yiew of Aben Ezra, 150. — Thomas Read says, . 151. — Rabbi 
&aadias Gaon says, 151.— What Dr. Osbon says of the passage, 152. 



274 



IXDEX. 



CHxVPTER IX. 

lilMOHTAL — I^IMORTALITY — EtEP.XAL LtFE. 

Principles of interpretation stated by Ricliard Watson, 153. — 
Do by Jeremy Tajdor, 153. — Do by Hooker, 153. — Inconsistencies 
exposed, 156-161. — What Watson says of consciousness, 1^2. — ■ 
What he says concerning the source ot life, 163. — Testimony of 
Darby, 163. — Eemarks by Aixhbishop Whately, 164. 

CHAPTER X. 
Eyep.laste^g Misery. 

A popular fallacy considered, 1G9-1T0. — Letter of Heinfetter to 
the members of the American Bible Union, 170. 

FART IL (of book.) 

CHAPTER XL 

The Wicked Perish. 

Important admission by John Wesley, 180. — Admission by 
Lange, 181. — Extract from an old English writer, 184. — Extract 
from Dr. Priestly, 184-185.— PauVs fliith, 185-187. 

CHAPTER XIL 
The Wicked shall be Destroyed. 
Old Testament proof, 190-196.— JSTew Testament proof, 196- 
200. — Death the doom of the finally impenitent, 201. 

CHAPTER XIII. 
Deyoured— CoxsmiED. 
Extract from Bible vs. Tradition, 203-205. 

CHxiPTER XIY. 
The Wicked vtill be Btjened. 
Various arguments, 206-211. — Important admission by Dr» 
Clarke, 209.— What Dr. Whedon says, 212. 

CHAPTER XY. 
What Popular Theology does with SiKXErvS. 
Remarks by Dr. Clarke on the word Ml, 213. — Bible 'vs. Tradi- 
tion on the word Ml, 213. — Testimony of Hezekiah, 215.— Testi- 
mony of Jacob, 216.— Benson on future state of wicked, 213. — Dr. 



275 



Edwards on future condition of wicked, 218. — Mr. Spurgcon on 
future condition of wicked, 219. — Stanza by Dr. Watts, 220. — San- 
rln's experience, 221. — Effect of believing the doctrine, 223. — Ad- 
mission by Dr. Curry, 223. — Address to preachers, of various 
churches, 223-224 — The torment doctrine not salutary, 22G. — Re- 
marks by Dr. Dwight, 229. — Remarks by Bishop iSTewton, 229. — 
Remarks by Dr. Edward Beecher, 230. 

CHAPTER XYI. 

The Docteixe of I^here^^t I:mmoetality. 

Admission of Bishop Watson, S 34, — what Richard Watson says, 
234.— What Archbishop Whately says, 235.— What Olshausensays, 
^35. — What^Dr. Proudfit says, 235. — Admission of Bishop Tilot- 
son, 235. — Decree of the Council under Pope Leo X., 236. — What 
Luther said of it, 237. — Arguments of Wm. Tyndale, 238. — Re- 
marks by J. Panton Ham concerning Leo X, 239. — Doctrine of 
Indulgence stated, 241. — Increase of the trafic, and why, 242. — 
Extract from D'Aithigne's Eeformafion^ 24:3. — Admission of a noted 
orthodox writer, 245. — The Egyptians the originators oi the doc- 
trine, 246. — Testimony of Herodotus, 247. — Testimony of Bunsen 
247. — Statements by Richard Watson, 248. — Remarks by Bishop 
Warburton, 248 — Remarks by Isaac Taylor, 248. — What James 
Hogg says, 249. — hat Dalton says, 250. — Remarks by Tytler, the 
historian, 251. — Pythagoras, Socrates, Cicero and Plato as advo- 
cates of inherent immortalit3^— 254-5.— What Prideaux says con- 
cerning the belief of the Pharisees, 255.— Immortality of the soul 
not generally believed by the ancients, 257. 

CHAPTER XVIL 

Scripture Motive to Obediexce and Faithfulness. 

Fulfilment ot gospel promises dependent upon the coming of 
Christ, 259,— Scripture motive to repentance, 260;— to mortifica- 
tion of animal lusts, 261 ;— to general obedience and holiness. 261 ; 
— to spiritual mindedness, 262;— to deeds of kindness and charity, 
26^; and to patience, long-suffering, and watchfulness, 263.— Gen- 
eral remarks, 264-268. 



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